Saudi’s Social Trading Platform Dawul raises $5M Seed round
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Riyad-based social trading platform Dawul has successfully raised $5M in its latest funding round. The SEED round was led by RAED Ventures with participation from Impact46, Seedra Ventures, Derayah Venture, and Sukna Ventures. This unprecedented SEED funding round puts the Saudi-based FinTech on the global trading map.
Dawul platform is a pioneering platform specialized in social trading. Established in 2020, it acquired a permit from the Saudi Capital Market Authority to conduct financial technology experiments by the end of the same year and was officially launched in July 2021. Dawul is built to help beginner investors keep looking for automated ways to execute trades or, even better, follow professional traders and their portfolios and investment strategies. This way, they can obtain details of the traders’ operations directly and in real-time.
Over 2021, and as we’ll soon observe in the release of our MAGNiTT exclusive end-of-year reports, the FinTech sector across Emerging Venture Markets has raised the lion’s share of investments, garnering more than 30% of total funds across geographies. In MENA, the FinTech sector observed more than 180% YoY growth in funding driven by major rounds raised by startups disrupting traditional banking, introducing new financial concepts, setting up for the future of cryptocurrency, or creating alternative solutions to serve the large unbanked portion of the community. Over in KSA, Saudi-based FinTech funding rounds in 2021 aggregated unprecedented amounts observing more than 1,000% YoY growth of VC funding in the sector. As Saudi Arabia pushes Tech ventures forward through regulatory progress and conducive capital environments, both part of their 2030 vision, the Saudi FinTech sector has been observing a remarkable boom. Of the top FinTech funding rounds in 2021 were insurance banking disruptor Rasan, Financing solutions platform Lendo, and Payment solutions platform Hala. Even though this funding round is positioned as an outlier to the payment crediting solutions FinTech trend in Saudi, it opens promising horizons for the development of the sector in different avenues for the years to come.
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Dawul introduced the “investment funds” product, which allows users to view the data of investment funds in the Saudi market, and to see all updates and analyses related to their own preferred funds. All this is through alerts and notifications that are sent periodically to help beginners in making decisions regarding the buying and selling of stocks, and the building of their investment portfolios in a transparent and safe manner. Mr. Al-Harbi believes that the Saudi market is a great opportunity for investors because it is the largest in the Middle East and North Africa region, and one of the 10 largest financial markets in the world. “Our aim at Dawul is to build a global product with Saudi resources. We always welcome Saudi talent who want to prove themselves in the field of fintech and join our company.” Co-founder of RAED Ventures Mr. Talal Alasmari commented on this funding round "There are enormous opportunities behind the concept of social trading which have not yet been applied in the region. We are pleased to be investing in Dawul platform which is the first to introduce this concept to the Saudi market through a safe and transparent platform, and with the support of the Capital Market Authority to raise awareness among investors. We believe in the ability of the Dawul team to expand and serve the whole MENA region."
Mohammed Alnasyan, senior investment analyst at Impact46, reflected on the impact of this latest investment “Many initiatives from the public and private sectors are raising awareness of the necessity of investing. With the increasing need for both scientific and practical material to delve into this field, Dawul’s business model covers this gap by enabling experts and knowledgeable people in the investment field to share their experience with beginners. We at Impact46 are betting on the experience of Dawul team led by Mr. Mansour Al-Harbi.”
As part of its strategy of spreading investor culture, Dawul plans to launch an educational game,” the Japanese candlestick game”. This game aims to educate beginners and enrich their knowledge in analysis methods of market volatility and its risks by making them practice stock price predictions based on stock data and trends of previous sessions. This will help them see results quickly with knowledge of the risks involved in buying and selling stocks. Mr. Al-Harbi believes that the Saudi market is a great opportunity for investors because it is the largest in the Middle East and North Africa region, and one of the 10 largest financial markets in the world. “Our aim at Dawul is to build a global product with Saudi resources. We always welcome Saudi talent who want to prove themselves in the field of fintech and join our company,” Al-Harbi concluded.
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