Genoese capital financed Portugal partly to outcompete Venice

Evidence

To the extent that [the Portuguese bourgeoisie] lacked the capital, they found it readily available from the Genoese who, for reasons of their own having to do with their rivalry with Venice, were ready to finance the Portuguese. And the potential conflict of the indigenous and foreign bourgeoisie was muted by the willingness of the Genoese to assimilate into Portuguese culture over time. — Cedric J. Robinson, Black Marxism_ The Making of the Black…, 531