Investors have backed fintech startups with a whopping $5.3 billion since January

Fintech startups received $5.3 billion (£3.7 billion) in funding in the first quarter of 2016, according to a new report from Accenture.

The report - published Wednesday and based on Accenture's analysis of fintech investment data from analyst firm CB Insights - shows that investment into fintech companies has increased by 67% on the same period last year.

The vast majority (62%) of fintech investments in Q1 2016 (between January 1 and March 31) went to businesses based in Europe and Asia, according to the report, which found that investment into fintech startups in these regions has nearly doubled since the same period last year.

"The proportion of competitive fintech ventures in Europe and Asia is much higher than in North America, which largely reflects the earlier stages of maturity of fintech markets, particularly outside of London," said Julian Skan, a managing director in Accenture's Financial Services group who oversees the FinTech Innovation Lab London.

"London's welcoming regulatory environment has made a preferred market for competitive fintech ventures to test their propositions," added Skan. "Banks too stand to benefit from this, as it drives momentum to re-imagine their own capabilities."

The report stated that collaborative fintech ventures - those primarily targeting banks and other financial institutions as customers - are gaining ground on so-called "disruptive" players that enter the market to compete against those institutions.

Funding for collaborative fintech ventures, which accounted for 38% of all fintech investment in 2010, grew to 44% of funding in 2015, with the remaining investments made in ventures that compete with financial institutions.

Consumer-facing fintech products offered by the likes of money transfer service TransferWise and peer-to-peer lender Funding Circle have raised hundreds of millions of pounds in the last couple of years as they look to take on the banks.

But Mark Tluszcz, CEO of Mangrove Capital and the first investor in Skype, told Business Insider in London this month that fintech is a bubble and investors are chasing returns.

"All the bad habits of humans, when money gets involved, will be exhibited in fintech in the next few years," said Tluszcz, adding that fintech firms are too small and lack the expertise to take on the banks.

"Investors have poured so much money into this but they've been doing it blindly," said Tluszcz. "The proof of the pudding is you're hardly seeing any exits. I couldn't care less what you say it's worth, there are no exits."