Fintech — a term that encompasses a range of companies and the collective impact and disruption they are causing — had a rollicking year in 2021. After a year of pandemic-induced chaos and uncertainty, fintech companies saw their best year ever in terms of venture capital funding. The foundational attributes that make fintech firms successful (and threatening to incumbents) have not changed. Yet we are entering a new phase, one in which fintech’s cumulative scale and influence becomes bigger even as a wave of new fintech companies play highly focused, almost-niche roles in customers’ lives.