Last year, PayPal announced a $100 million commitment to invest in startups across the Middle East and Africa. The announcment looked like a watershed moment for the region’s fintech ecosystem. The pledge — to be deployed through minority equity stakes, potential acquisitions, and follow-on funding — signalled that one of the world’s most recognised payments brands was finally getting serious about one of its fastest-growing markets.
That was then.
Today, PayPal Ventures, the corporate venture arm through which much of that capital was to flow, has quietly paused new investment activity. Multiple sources said the unit is winding down operations, a development confirmed by a company spokesperson — albeit in carefully hedged language.
“As part of our continued efforts to sharpen our focus, we are exploring strategic options for our corporate venture arm,” the spokesperson said.
For the startups and ecosystems that had anticipated a flush new backer, the timing could hardly be worse.
The $100 million pledge was announced under former CEO Alex Chriss, who had framed the commitment as central to PayPal’s ambition in emerging markets. “We’re investing in the solutions that will help entrepreneurs scale faster and expand their reach beyond borders,” Chriss said at the time.
The announcement came five months after PayPal opened its first regional hub in Dubai, designed to connect businesses across the Middle East and Africa to its global payment infrastructure. It built on an already-active — if selective — investment portfolio in the region, including South African open banking fintech Stitch, Egyptian payments platform Paymob, and UAE-based buy-now-pay-later company Tabby.
In April 2025, PayPal Ventures participated as a follow-on investor in Stitch’s $55 million funding round. The $100 million pot was supposed to formalise and accelerate that kind of bet.
But Chriss is no longer at the helm. He departed in February 2026, replaced by HP veteran Enrique Lores. The PayPal board said Chriss had failed to keep pace with industry changes and did not meet its expectations — a blunt rebuke that set the tone for what was to come.
Lores arrived with a restructuring mandate and has moved quickly. Cuts and layoffs are expected to continue over the next several years. PayPal is also reportedly exploring secondary sales to offload some of its venture holdings and has hired investment bank Jefferies to help facilitate that process.
In the company’s first-quarter earnings call, Lores told investors that PayPal needed to “recommit to the fundamentals” — a phrase that included, notably, “becoming a technology company again.” The implication was clear: the expansive bets of the Chriss era, including ambitious regional commitments like the Africa and Middle East fund, would be scrutinised under a new lens.
PayPal Ventures still technically exists. A small number of employees continue to support its existing portfolio of startups, and the unit has made more than 80 investments over its lifespan — including crypto trading platform Talos Global, fintech infrastructure company Plaid, and crypto bank Anchorage Digital. Across three funds, it raised $850 million in total.
But new investments have stopped, at least for now. Whether the $100 million earmarked for the Middle East and Africa will eventually be deployed — through a restructured vehicle, a new partnership model, or not at all — remains an open question.
Emerging market fintech funding has already cooled from its 2021–2022 peaks, and growth-stage rounds — typically between $20 million and $75 million — remain the hardest to close on the continent. A dedicated $100 million pot from a strategic backer would have meaningfully addressed that need.