Published:
May 24, 2025
Author:
Sarah Parsons Wolter
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The American dream may have a new mascot, and it’s not the crypto cowboy or tech unicorn—it’s the guy who sells floor scrapers to elementary schools. He’s part of a quietly thriving class of entrepreneurs turning mundane necessities into million-dollar empires.
These operators of “boring businesses”—think dental chains, beverage distributors, car washes, and commercial flooring equipment—are the backbone of a growing wealth cohort dubbed the stealthy wealthy. Unlike founders chasing moonshots or financiers swinging for the fences, this group is focused on slow-burn cash flow, local dominance, and long-term ownership. Their riches aren’t made overnight, but through decades of controlling simple, necessary, defensible businesses that are as recession-proof as they are forgettable.
It turns out one of the most powerful engines of wealth creation in America is business ownership. Recent research from economists at Princeton and the University of Chicago shows that, after paychecks, private business income has become the largest—and fastest-growing—source of income for the top 1% of earners, rising from 30% to nearly 35% over the past decade. Among the 0.1%, it now makes up over 43% of income.
So next time you’re playing with a vending machine like Dwight, remember: there’s a business owner behind it—restocking snacks, fixing glitches, and quietly collecting the cash. He’s not chasing headlines or pitching on stage, but he’s building a fortune—one hallway, one soda, one service call at a time. The real question is: which of today’s overlooked services will become tomorrow’s stealth fortunes?
Portfolio News
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Termii ranked #1 in Media and Telecommunications on Financial Times Africa's Fastest-Growing Companies list - The annual FT ranking, compiled in partnership with Statista, highlights companies across the continent demonstrating exceptional revenue growth, scalability, and regional impact. Termii's recognition reflects its leadership in powering secure customer messaging, identity verification, and cross-border SIM connectivity for African and global businesses. Read more
Octane earns a 2025 FICO Decision Award; responsibly expands credit access with FICO Auto Score 10 - Global analytics software leader FICO today announced that Octane earned a 2025 FICO® Decision Award for Customer Onboarding and Management. Since 2016, Octane has partnered with FICO to support its risk management and responsibly expand credit access, growing originations by 36% year-over-year and closing four AAA-rated asset-backed securitizations, surpassing $4b in asset-backed securitization to date. Read more
JPMorgan will actively manage a Bitcoin fund for customers, outsourcing custody to NYDIG - JPMorgan will release a managed fund for Bitcoin investors this summer, but will not maintain custody of a Bitcoin wallet – rather, the custody of cryptocurrencies will be outsourced to NYDIG. The mega bank seems to be the least likely institution to embrace Bitcoin, given the comments made by its CEO. Read more
Wayne-Sanderson Farms and Vestwel collaborate to create retirement-savings program for farmers - This collaboration underscores a significant step toward bridging the savings gap for agricultural workers, one of the American economy's most essential yet traditionally underserved sectors. Read more
From infrastructure to analytics: a fireside chat with Zach Perret, CEO of Plaid - Plaid started as an API for your bank account and helped launch a generation of fintech innovation. Today, it’s a data network powering intelligent decision-making across the financial ecosystem. In this one-hour session, Zach will share how Plaid is evolving and what that transformation means for the future of digital finance. To learn more, you can register here. Read more
Scrapping Up Fortunes
Meet the ‘Stealthy Wealthy’ who make their money the boring way - Behind a paycheck, the largest source of income for the 1% highest earners in the U.S. isn’t being a partner at an investment bank or launching a one-in-a-million tech startup. It is owning a medium-size regional business. Many of them are distinctly boring and extremely lucrative, like auto dealerships, beverage distributors, grocery stores, dental practices and law firms. Read more
Meet the takeover king who leans on yoga and team bonding to make billions - The 68-year-old, who has built a career striking more than 500 deals in sleepy industries such as garbage collection and supply-chain logistics, has become an unlikely guru in M&A circles. He does a lot of the things familiar to any Wall Street takeover artist, like hunting down targets, turning up the pressure to clinch deals and slashing costs while rolling up businesses. But he wraps those tactics in a much different package, bringing an effervescent, feel-good vibe to a world known for ruthlessness and no-nonsense finance speak. Read more
Industry News
Banks are shifting quickly to crypto as new rules loom - Banks and the companies whose technology underpins much of the finance industry say the shift could become clear as soon as this summer, when banks’ business customers would be allowed to pay overseas suppliers with stablecoins and consumers would be able to use them for purchases. Read more
Donald Trump considers order to open US retirement plans to private equity - The order would instruct agencies such as the departments of labour and Treasury and the Securities and Exchange Commission to study the feasibility of opening 401k plans, a primary vehicle for US retirement savings, to the private funds. Top industry executives predict that offering their funds to 401k retirement plans could attract hundreds of billions of dollars in new industry assets. Read more
Apple, Tesla and Nvidia shares to trade as digital tokens on crypto exchange Kraken - Kraken plans to allow non-U. S. customers to trade many popular stocks as tokens over a digital ledger. Such “tokenized equities” would make it easier for non-Americans to invest in U.S. stocks, the company says. Like bitcoin, they would trade 24 hours a day, seven days a week—even when the U.S. stock market is closed. Read more
Retail brokers sidestep market-making giants with private rooms - In the cut-throat world of US stock trading, some smaller players have devised a tactic to sidestep the giant high-speed market makers who have come to dominate the business of buying and selling shares. A handful of upstart brokers are taking retail orders — equity trades placed by individual investors — into special off-exchange venues known as private rooms. Read more
Circle launches stablecoin-powered cross-border payments network - Designed to facilitate the use of stablecoins for mainstream cross-border payments, this network and coordination protocol enables financial institutions to exchange payment instructions and settling transactions on open, public blockchains. CPN supports B2B supplier payments, cross-border remittances, treasury and global cash consolidations, recurring enterprise payments, and payroll and mass disbursements. Read more
UBS deploys AI analyst clones - UBS has started using artificial intelligence to turn its analysts into avatars, sending videos of the simulated bankers to clients in a move the lender said would free up staff to focus on more productive tasks. The Zurich-based bank is using OpenAI and Synthesia models to create AI-generated scripts and avatars of its analysts following increased client demand for research in video format, UBS said. Read more
UK to regulate ‘buy now, pay later’ lenders in legal overhaul - Lenders that specialise in BNPL services will have to abide by similar rules to mainstream banks under long-awaited legislation that will result in them being fully regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority. Under the rules, lenders such as Klarna and Clearpay will be required to check shoppers’ affordability before offering loans, while borrowers will be able to make complaints to the Financial Ombudsman. Read more
Binance and Pix team to drive instant crypto payments in Brazil - The integration allows people to use Binance Pay and Pix to make instant payments in the local currency using cryptocurrencies and transfers to any individual or merchant in Latin America’s largest country. Read more
Circle pursues IPO—but talks with Coinbase and Ripple could mean a sale - There is a chance, though, that Circle’s IPO won’t come to fruition since the company has recently taken part in informal talks to sell itself to Coinbase Global, the largest crypto exchange in the U.S., or to crypto payments company Ripple, according to four banking and private equity executives. Circle is seeking at least $5b, which is the valuation that it’s targeting for its IPO. Read more
Watch me try Google’s live language translator. It’s wild - Google Meet is launching a real-time speech translator that emulates the speaker’s voice and tone in another language. The translator, initially available for English and Spanish, will be available for Gemini subscribers, with business options later this year. Read more
Treasury sounds death knell for penny production - The Treasury Department will stop putting new pennies into circulation by early next year. Afterward, there won’t be enough pennies to use in everyday cash transactions, and businesses will need to start rounding up or down to the nearest 5 cents, the Treasury said in a statement. Read more
Select Financings
Affiniti - San Francisco based expense management platform for SMBs raised $17m in Series A funding led by SignalFire. Read more
Airwallex - San Francisco based global payments platform raised $300m in growth funding led by Square Peg. Read more
Algoma - New York based real estate development platform raised $2.3m in Seed funding led by Zacua Ventures. Read more
Aufinity - Germany based automotive payments platform raised $26m in Series C funding led by BlackFin Capital Partners. Read more
Button Finance - New York based home equity lending platform raised $5m in Series A funding led by Hildene Capital Management. Read more
Catena Labs - Boston based AI-native financial institution raised $18m in Seed funding led by a16z crypto. Read more
Clair - New York based earned wage access platform raised $23.2m in Series B funding led by Upfront Ventures. Read more
FanBasis - Miami based creator economy infrastructure platform raised $20m in Series A funding led by Left Lane Capital. Read more
Filed - San Francisco based tax automation platform raised $17.2m in Seed funding led by Northzone. Read more
Greenlite AI - San Francisco based AI agent platform to fight financial crime raised $15m in Series A funding led by Greylock. Read more
Lendflow - Austin based embedded credit platform raised $15m in new funding led by Trinity Capital. Read more
Novisto - Montreal based sustainability reporting startup raised $27m in Series C funding led by Inovia Capital. Read more
Ontik - London based digital trade credit platform raised $3.7m in Seed funding led by Firstminute Capital. Read more
Seeds - New York based personalized investment platform for advisors raised $10m in Series A funding led by Portage. Read more
Sylndr - Cairo based used car marketplace and mobility platform raised $15.7m in new funding led by Nclude Fund. Read more
Thndr - Cairo based investment platform raised $15.7m in new funding led by Prosus. Read more
True Markets - New York based stablecoin-native DeFi trading app raised $11m in Series A funding led by Accomplice and RRE Ventures. Read more
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