How Percent Raised $50M: A Fintech Fundraising Guide

Nelson Chu, CEO of Percent, has raised over $50 million from top-tier firms like Forté Ventures, White Star Capital, and B Capital. This isn't just another funding announcement. It's a case study in how to build a venture in a complex, high-stakes market: alternative investments.

Generic fundraising advice won't get you there. You need to translate your unique history into a powerful narrative that convinces investors you're the only one who can win. Let's break down the non-obvious lessons from Chu's journey that you can apply to your own raise.

Your "Failed" Startup Is Your Most Valuable Asset

Before Percent, Chu had another startup that didn't work out. Many founders try to bury this history. They see it as a liability, a stain on their record. This is a massive strategic error.

The Common Mistake: Hiding Your Scars

When an investor asks, "What did you do before this?" you might be tempted to gloss over a venture that shut down. You say, "I was exploring some ideas in the space," or you downplay it. Investors see right through this. They assume you're either hiding a catastrophic failure or, worse, that you didn't learn anything from the experience.

The Pro Move: Frame Failure as Earned Insight

Experienced founders do the opposite. They put the failure front and center and articulate exactly what they learned. Your previous failure is the MBA you paid for with sweat and tears. It taught you something about the market, team building, or customer acquisition that you couldn't have learned in a book. It de-risks your current venture.

Your job isn't to pretend you've never failed. It's to prove you fail intelligently.

Weak: "I had a startup before this that didn't get traction."

Strong: "My first company failed because we couldn't solve the cold-start problem in a two-sided marketplace. The lessons from that experience are baked into our new GTM strategy, which focuses on winning one side of the market first. We learned that lesson the hard way, so you don’t have to fund it again."

Founder-Market Fit Isn't a Buzzword — It's Your Unfair Advantage

Chu's resume includes wealth management and a stint at BlackRock, one of the world's largest asset managers. This isn't just a line on a bio; it’s the entire reason he can build a company like Percent, which aims to bring transparency and accessibility to the opaque world of private credit.

The Common Mistake: "I Have Domain Expertise"

Founders love to claim "domain expertise." It’s a vague, meaningless phrase. It doesn't tell an investor anything specific. Anyone can read a few industry reports and claim expertise. It signals you don't truly understand what makes you special.

The Pro Move: Connect Your Resume Directly to the Problem

Your unique advantage comes from the specific problems you experienced firsthand. You aren’t just a “fintech expert.” You are the person who spent three years at a major firm manually reconciling alternative investment data in Excel and saw the seven-figure errors it caused. That’s your "earned secret."

For Chu, his experience allowed him to walk into investor meetings and say:

"When I was at BlackRock, I saw multi-billion dollar funds struggle with the same primitive infrastructure for private credit. It was opaque, illiquid, and entirely relationship-driven. Percent is building the digital plumbing I wish we had — a platform to standardize, underwrite, and distribute these assets. I know the buyers, I know the sellers, and I know the exact pain points that prevent this market from scaling."

This specificity gives you credibility that no outsider can replicate.

A $50M Raise Is a Campaign, Not an Event

No one writes a $50 million check in one go at the beginning. That number represents a journey across multiple funding rounds, each with a different purpose and a different set of investor expectations.

Stage 1: The Seed Round (~$1M-$4M)

Here, you are selling the story, the team, and the vision. For a company like Percent, the seed pitch would have been all about Nelson Chu’s founder-market fit. The question investors ask is: "Are these the people with the unique insight and resilience to tackle this massive problem?"

Your Goal: Build the initial product and validate your core thesis with a handful of early "design partner" customers. · Your Pitch: Focus on the "Why You, Why Now." Your team's background, the market shift you've identified, and your earned secret.

Stage 2: The Series A (~$10M-$20M)

This round is about proving you have a repeatable engine. The story is no longer enough. You need data. You’ve moved from "I have a theory" to "I have proof."

Your Goal: Scale your go-to-market strategy. Hire key sales and engineering leads. · Your Pitch: Focus on traction and unit economics. Show metrics like customer acquisition cost (CAC), lifetime value (LTV), and early revenue growth. For Percent, this would mean showing a steady increase in the volume of assets being managed or transacted on the platform.

Stage 3: The Growth Round (Series B+, $25M+)

By now, you've established product-market fit. This stage, where firms like B Capital often invest, is about market ownership. You’re pouring fuel on a fire that’s already burning brightly.

Your Goal: Become the dominant player in your category. Expand into new markets or product lines. · Your Pitch: Focus on financial performance, market share, and defensibility. You are presenting a predictable, high-growth business with a clear path to profitability and a strong competitive moat.

For Fintech Founders, Trust Is a Tangible Asset

In markets involving other people's money—especially opaque ones like alternative investments—your most important product is trust. Percent’s mission is to bring transparency to this world. This means trust is not a "nice-to-have"; it's the core asset.

The Common Mistake: "We'll Figure Out Regulation Later"

Inexperienced fintech founders often treat compliance and regulation as a nuisance to be dealt with after they find product-market fit. This is a fatal error. Sophisticated investors know that regulatory missteps can kill a company overnight. A vague plan is a major red flag.

The Pro Move: Build a "Trust Stack" from Day One

You need a deliberate strategy for building trust with investors, partners, and customers. It’s a tangible part of your pitch and your operations.

Founder Credibility: Your personal history in the industry. (As discussed above). · Strategic Early Adopters: Your first customers are a signal. Landing even a small, but well-respected, asset originator or family office sends a powerful message that "people in the know" trust you. · A Detailed Compliance Roadmap: You don't need every license on day one, but you need a slide in your deck that shows you understand the regulatory landscape. Name the specific licenses you'll need, the timeline for acquiring them, and the legal counsel you're working with. This shows maturity. · Transparent Product & Security: Your product itself must embody transparency. Clear dashboards, straightforward reporting, and bank-grade security aren't just features; they are trust-building tools. Be ready to talk about your security audits and data handling policies.

How to Apply This to Your Raise This Week

Reading about a $50M raise is one thing; applying the lessons is another. Here are four concrete actions you can take right now.

Re-write your "About Me" slide. Erase the phrase "domain expert." Instead, write three bullet points connecting a specific past job or project directly to the problem you are solving now. Quantify the pain you saw. · Write your "Failure Resume." Take a past project or company that failed. Write one paragraph that starts: "That venture didn't work out, and it taught us three invaluable lessons that now form the core of our current strategy..." · Audit your investor targets. For each firm on your list, write one sentence explaining why they are a fit for your specific stage. Are they a seed fund that bets on teams? A Series A fund that understands your GTM model? A growth firm with a fintech thesis? If you can't answer, cut them from the list. · Create a "Trust Stack" slide. Map out your plan for building credibility. Include your team’s background, your ideal first customers, your compliance roadmap, and how your product builds trust. This will force you to move from vague assertions to a concrete, defensible plan.