AEFI
AEFI, the Asociación Española de Fintech e Insurtech, is the association of financial technology and insurance technology companies in Spain and was founded in 2016. AEFI represents these companies before Spanish and European regulators, supervisors and legislators. The association wants Spain to become a hub for fintech and insurtech, with rules that favor financial, insurance and regulatory innovation.
AEFI counts 160 member companies, from payment institutions and neobanks to crowdfunding platforms, robo-advisors, crypto firms and insurtechs. The members are organized in twelve verticals, each led by a coordinator, and a research area of the association writes white papers and reports on the sector. AEFI also runs initiatives for Madrid as a fintech center and for women in fintech.
Members and verticals
The members of AEFI include international firms such as PayPal, N26, Qonto, Checkout.com, Raisin and Younited as well as Spanish companies such as Finnovating and Fundeen. Next to its member companies, AEFI works with about twenty business, legal and academic partners and represents about 10,000 professionals in the sector.
The twelve verticals of AEFI are digital assets, crowdfunding and crowdlending, personal finance, financial infrastructure, insurtech, online lending, marketplaces and aggregators, neobanks and challenger banks, paytech, regtech and digital identity, transactional services and foreign exchange, and wealthtech. Each vertical groups the members that offer the same kind of service, and its coordinator speaks for them in the work of the association.
President and board
The general assembly of AEFI renewed the board unanimously in April 2026 for a term of four years. Arturo Mac Dowell continues as president, with Silvia Escámez, chief executive of Finteca, and Rodrigo García de la Cruz, chief executive of Finnovating, as vice presidents. Pilar Andrade, Alfonso Ayuso and Ángela Aso are members of the board, and Felipe Cavero, partner at Across Legal, is secretary general.
Leyre Celdrán is the managing director of AEFI and leads the staff of the association. Rodrigo García de la Cruz also represents AEFI on the supervisory board of the European Digital Finance Association.
Office and seat in Madrid
The office of AEFI is at Fintech Plaza, Calle Príncipe de Vergara 112, in 28002 Madrid. The registered seat of the association is at Calle Seminario de Nobles 4 in 28015 Madrid, and AEFI is entered in the national register of associations of Spain.
Upcoming fintech and finance events in Europe
Madrid International Capital Fintech
With the support of the Madrid City Council, AEFI runs Madrid International Capital Fintech, an initiative to make Madrid a leading financial and technology hub in Spain and abroad. The initiative connects startups, financial institutions, investors and the media and shares studies and reports on the fintech and insurtech sector.
Regulation and the Spanish sandbox
AEFI published its first white paper on fintech regulation in 2017 and argued for a financial sandbox in Spain from the start. Spain created this regulatory sandbox with Law 7/2020 on the digital transformation of the financial system, and companies can apply in two cohorts each year. The projects are tested under the supervision of the Banco de España, the securities regulator CNMV and the insurance authority DGSFP.
Further white papers of AEFI deal with insurtech, paytech, lending and regtech, and the second edition of the white paper on fintech came out in October 2024. In 2018 the association published a code of good practice for fintech and insurtech companies, and in 2023 it wrote a report on the digitalization of the insurance industry together with the insurers association UNESPA.
Fintech Women Network
AEFI launched the Fintech Women Network in 2018 to promote women as founders and leaders in fintech and insurtech. The network runs a six-month mentoring program for projects led by women, holds regular networking meetings and publishes a report on women in the sector, which reached its ninth edition in 2026.
Work in Europe and Latin America
AEFI is a member of the European Digital Finance Association, which associations from nine countries, Spain among them, founded in Brussels in 2020. AEFI also takes part in the Alianza FinTech Iberoamérica, and in 2024 it presented the Global FinTech Alliance of national fintech associations in Madrid.
AEFI and Finance Loop
Fintech and insurtech companies in Spain and the members of Finance Loop work under the same European rules, from MiCAR for crypto-asset services to the Digital Operational Resilience Act for the IT security of financial firms. Finance Loop brings people from banks, payment companies and fintech firms in several European countries together at its events on payments and digital assets.
Finance Loop is a professional network and has the goal of driving the institutional use of emerging technologies in finance, such as AI, tokenization, stablecoins, and DeFi. Finance Loop helps its members build skills and personal networks in these fields: Investment & Digital Assets, Payments & Digital Money, Digital Infrastructure & Sovereignty, and Risk & Compliance.