Referral Partnerships Scale LatAm Fintech
René Saul and Fernando Sandoval, co-founders at Kapital, on the fintech opportunity in LatAm
This reveals that Kapital’s growth engine is built to make acquisition cost show up only after revenue shows up. Instead of paying Meta or Google upfront and hoping small businesses convert, Kapital uses chambers of commerce and referrals to reach already organized SMB groups, then pays partners when an account actually opens. That matters even more in LatAm, where lending and software cross sell can turn one cheap lead into a long lived, multi product customer.
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Kapital has used local chambers of commerce in Mexico, Colombia, Peru, and Chile as distribution partners, which gives it access to member lists, events, email campaigns, and call centers. That is closer to outsourced field sales than brand advertising, and it fits an SMB product that often needs trust and explanation before sign up.
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The unit economics are stronger because Kapital does not rely on card interchange alone. In LatAm, interchange is only 0.5% to 0.9%, so Kapital monetizes through SaaS subscriptions and lending, with cross sell expanding LTV after the initial partner sourced sale. That makes low CAC especially valuable because each acquired customer has more ways to pay back acquisition spend.
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The contrast with U.S. players is structural. Brex grew fast by offering a free card into startups and monetizing interchange, while Kapital operates in a market with fewer banks serving SMBs and uses partnerships to land distribution, then bundles bank accounts, lending, expense management, and treasury into one stack. The partner is not just a lead source, it is the front door to a broader financial operating system.
Going forward, the winners in LatAm B2B fintech will look less like ad driven SaaS companies and more like ecosystem distributors with financial products attached. As Kapital adds payroll, contractor payments, and more treasury tools, each partner channel should become more productive, because the same customer acquired once can adopt more products over time without repeating the acquisition spend.