Irish venture capital investment slowed in the second quarter of the year as global economic uncertainty around US import tariffs led to cautious investments after a strong start to the year, a KPMG report has found.
The Big Four accountancy firm’s Venture Pulse report found investment activity dropped 79.6 per cent to $136.4 million (€116.4 million) across 20 deals in the second quarter, down from $668 million across 28 deals in the first quarter.
KPMG noted the sector’s first-quarter performance was fuelled by three major deals, each valued at more than $100 million.
The firm said the decline was a result of “both a natural pause given the significant investment seen in the previous quarter and the general state of uncertainty in the broader macroeconomic and geopolitical environment”.
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Its report noted that investor sentiment and outlook for the second half of 2025 remained “cautiously positive” due to the Irish sector’s focus on software companies, which have less exposure to US tariffs, and the “positive valuations” of Irish start-ups in recent months.
While venture capital funding dropped in the period, Ireland’s financial technology, or fintech, sector saw a boost of investment in the first half of the year, a separate KPMG report published on Tuesday found.
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The Pulse of FinTech report noted that investment activity in the global financial technology market was down $9.5 billion in the first six months of 2025, to $44.7 billion, when compared with the latter half of 2024 when $54.2 billion was invested.
Ireland’s sector bucked this trend with deal volumes and value rising, however. A total of $173 million was invested across 13 deals in the first six months of this year compared to $140.8 million in the previous six-month period.
There were large investments into NomuPay and Wayflyer, which raised $77 million and $35 million respectively to fund expansion goals in the first half of the year.
Europe, Middle East and Africa (Emea) was the only major region to see growth of fintech investment.
The largest region, the Americas, recorded a drop of 25 per cent in fintech investment from $35.7 billion to $26.7 billion.
