The fintech industry is experienced impressive growth, which should continue in 2022. With that in mind, today I'll analyze and compare two fintech companies, PayPal Holdings (NASDAQ:PYPL) and Affirm Holdings (AFRM), to see which stock is currently the better investment.The fintech industry has witnessed massive growth in recent years amid increasing digitalization processes caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. According to Market Data Forecast, the global fintech industry is estimated to reach $324 billion, growing at a CAGR of 23.4% over the next five years.
However, year-to-date (YTD), the fintech industry underperformed the whole market due to the increasing industry regulations as well as other industry-specific challenges, as evidenced by the 9.23% decrease in the Global X FinTech Thematic ETF (FINX).
In this article, I intend to analyze and compare two fintech stocks: PayPal Holdings, Inc. (PYPL) and Affirm Holdings, Inc. (AFRM). Affirm operates as a financial technology company that offers a state-of-the-art “buy now, pay later” lending platform for e-commerce transactions. PayPal is one the largest debit electronic payment systems that allows customers to pay bills and purchases, send and receive money transfers. YTD, shares of PYPL are down 18%, while AFRM stock has increased 0.5% over the same period.