Why We Invested in SUMA Wealth
We are excited to share that SUMA Wealth has raised $2.2MM in seed funding while also celebrating a major milestone of reaching one million users across its platforms. Chingona Ventures initially led SUMA Wealth’s pre-seed round in 2020, and doubled down on its conviction in the company with a follow-on investment during SUMA’s seed round. This additional funding will support SUMA’s continued growth as the company looks to hire across engineering, product, and sales as well as invest in new technology, AI, and data analytics.
SUMA Wealth (“SUMA”) is the leading financial technology company devoted to increasing prosperity, opportunity, and financial inclusion for young U.S. Latinos and their families. SUMA’s innovative approach deploys technology to build financial tools that are engaging, culturally relevant, and useful to its community. Since our initial investment, SUMA has shown significant traction by securing partnerships with notable financial institutions (including J.P. Morgan, Wells Fargo, Fidelity, and Morgan Stanley), boasting 62% annual user growth, and increasing revenue by 4.8x in 2023 alone.
SUMA is fearlessly led by its co-founder and CEO, Beatriz Acevedo — a seasoned entrepreneur with a strong track record of building iconic brands for Latino audiences. Beatriz leverages a deep knowledge of what moves this influential demographic as shaped by her former role as the co-founder and President of Mitú, a digital media company created to bring a Latino point-of-view to mainstream entertainment. During her time at Mitú, Beatriz helped the company raise $53MM+ in funding, scale to one billion views, successfully exit via an acquisition, and win three Emmys along the way. Beatriz leads her “Sí Suite” alongside Mary Hernandez and Daniela Corrente, making SUMA one of the 0.03% of all U.S. FinTech companies managed solely by Latinas. We like to say that SUMA “kept it in the family” as it acquired fellow Chingona Ventures portfolio company, Reel, and brought on Daniela as its Chief Strategy and Business Officer in 2023.
While we were drawn to SUMA Wealth given Beatriz’s impressive background as an entrepreneur, keynote speaker, social advocate, and philanthropist, we were even more excited about her ambitious, purpose-driven mission to narrow the Latino wealth gap. U.S. Latinos currently represent the second-largest ethnic group in the country, accounting for 19.1% of the population and expected to increase to 26.9% by 2060. However, in contrast, U.S. Latinos have been widely underserved by traditional banks and money management platforms. A lack of personalized tools and messaging for this historically disadvantaged demographic has led to significant challenges in navigating, maintaining, and building wealth. For example, in 2021, the median wealth of a Latino household in the U.S. was $48,720, which is less than 20% of non-Hispanic White households’ median wealth of $250,400.
With Latinos driving 53% of U.S. population growth over the last decade, Beatriz believes that “betting on young Latinos… is a winning strategy” — and at Chingona Ventures, we can’t help but agree. With this in mind, Beatriz and team have set out to tackle this $182 billion opportunity, with the goal of creating personalized, user-centric content and brand-based experiences that inspire, inform, and support young Latinos to build wealth and control their financial futures. Through SUMA’s multiple platforms, including the SUMA app, Sumaveristy, the Dinero (“Money”) Toolkit, and Money Talks blog, the company looks to drive positive change in the financial wellbeing and livelihood of the 63.6M Latinos throughout the U.S., all while bridging the Latino wealth gap.
Even as an early-stage company, SUMA Wealth has already made a measurable impact on the Latino community. As Beatriz most recently shared on LinkedIn, the company’s Sumaversity program — which teaches critical financial literacy skills such as budgeting, credit card/loan management, credit scores, and retirement/investing through an interactive, challenge-based course — made a significant impact on its participants just last year. By participating in the Sumaversity challenges:
2,038 individuals successfully reduced their debt.
2,391 participants acquired new financial assets like homes, credit cards, savings accounts, and retirement savings.
2,542 people increased their savings.
2,354 users improved their financial literacy by up to 50%, leaving the program with a newfound sense of confidence and control.
On average, these participants were managing three financial accounts for other family members. In turn, this initiative had an exponential effect and positively impacted over 10,000 individuals.
We continue to be excited about our involvement with SUMA Wealth — and are grateful that the excitement is mutual. SUMA’s co-founder and CEO, Beatriz Acevedo, recently shared with us, “Chingona Ventures was SUMA Wealth’s first investor, and Samara’s role goes beyond investment; she is a committed board member and advisor who deeply cares about our company as well as our Latino community, making her partnership not just financial but genuinely transformative.”
SUMA Wealth aligns with Chingona Ventures’ investment thesis given that it is an early-stage company falling at the intersection of FinTech and Future of Learning. The company is joined by our robust portfolio of other FinTech investments, including Kudos, EarlyBird, and Boom. In addition, its target consumer of the Latino community presents an opportunity to serve a widely overlooked but growing market. Over three years later, we continue to have high conviction in the SUMA team which has exemplified great leadership, received market validation, and generated exponential user growth.
We look forward to working with SUMA to further its mission of bringing financial literacy and inclusion to the Latino community by making money matters relatable, accessible, and simple to understand. To learn more about SUMA Wealth, visit www.sumawealth.com.
