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Revolut
British multinational neobank From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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Revolut Group Holdings Ltd, known as Revolut,[2] is a British multinational neobank. It was founded in July 2015 by British-Russian businessman Nikolay Storonsky and British-Ukrainian software engineer Vlad Yatsenko.[3] As of 2025, Revolut operates in over 48 countries and has 65 million customers.[4][5][6]
The bank offers free and subscription-based digital banking services, primarily through a mobile app.[7][8]
The company is headquartered in London.[9]
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History
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Early history (2015–2017)
Revolut was founded in 2015 by Nikolay Storonsky and Vlad Yatsenko, offering individuals in the United Kingdom and European Economic Area (EEA) a smartphone app to spend money abroad using interbank foreign exchange rates.[10][11] Customers could use their Revolut card in 90 countries.[12][10]
In 2016, the company reached around 300,000 users, processing almost £1 billion in transactions.[13]
Revolut then launched a subscription-based app in June 2017 available to businesses across the UK and Europe. Under the name of "Revolut Business", businesses could create an account with a multi-currency IBAN to hold, exchange, and transfer money with 25 currencies.[14][15]
The company was affected by a major outage with their card processor Global Processing Services in June 2017, causing card payments to fail.[16][17]
EU banking license and international expansion (2017–2022)
It first applied for their EU banking license in November 2017, at which time it also started work on its own payment processor.[18][19] The bank then received its EU banking license as well as an EMI license in December 2018 from the European Central Bank, facilitated by the Bank of Lithuania. Under its new license, the bank could accept deposits and offer consumer credits. However, it was not allowed to provide investment services until later.[20][21][22]
Following the acquisition of a banking license, the company announced plans in September 2019 for expansion into 24 new markets across the United States, Asia, and other regions, supported by agreements with Visa and Mastercard. The company said that they also want to hire an additional 3,500 employees.[23][24][25] In 2019, the Revolut app launched in beta to the Australia region.[26] The following month, Revolut expanded to Singapore.[27] In 2020, the app launched in the United States and Japan.[28][29]
By November 2020, Revolut reported that it had reached breakeven. At that time, it was valued at £4.2 billion.[30]
The company applied for banking license in the United Kingdom and a bank charter in the United States in early 2021.[31][32][33] The European Central Bank also granted Revolut a full banking licence later that year.[34][35]
Since 2022
After having secured bank licenses, Revolut started moving away from being an e-money institution to a bank. In January 2022, they started operating as a bank in 10 European countries.[36]
The Financial Times reported in July 2023 that Revolut had lost $20 million to organized criminal groups due to a flaw in its US payment system between late 2021 and early 2022.[37] The issue affected the company's corporate funds; some of the money was recouped.[37] Later that year, Revolut announced that they would stop offering cryptocurrency trading services to their US customers due to the "evolving regulatory environment" as the Securities and Exchange Commission intensified regulations regarding certain crypto assets and platforms.[38]
The company was the target of a cyberattack in September 2022. A third-party obtained access to tens of thousands of customer details.The personal data of over 50,000 customers was accessed by the perpetrator.[39][40] In the same month, The UK's Financial Conduct Authority added Revolut to its list of companies authorized to offer cryptocurrency products and services. The company offered unregulated crypto trading before 2022.[41]
In January 2023, the company announced that it would transfer its 2 million Irish customers to a new Irish branch, moving them from a Lithuanian IBAN to an Irish IBAN.[42] This was followed by a launch for IBANs in France, Netherlands and Spain in September 2023.[43]
Around this time, the bank also began allowing staking for holders of proof of stake cryptocurrencies in the UK and EEA.[41][44] In October 2023, Revolut expanded its stock trading services to include European stock trading in the EEA.[45][46][47] By the end of the year, it was reported that they held £15.1 billion in customer deposits.[48][49][50][51] It was also reported that, despite ongoing uncertainty regarding the UK banking license, the company swung to a £25m loss in 2022..[52]
In August 2024, the company was seen to be preparing for a potential IPO on the Nasdaq.[53] The company also doubled its headcount over the past two years, employing over 8,000 people in more than 25 countries.[54] The company faced criticism from local Portuguese banks about unfair competition after its subsidiary, "Revolut Bank UAB", was granted a full banking license by the ECB.[55] Revolut was also granted a British banking license the following month, though with restrictions via the standard "mobilization" stage.[56][57][58]
A report in October 2024 found that Revolut was named in more fraud complaints in the UK than any major bank in the country, sparking a debate on the effectiveness of its security controls.[59][60][61] By the end of 2024, Revolut reported having 50 million registered users globally.[62] In 2023, they had over one million daily active users.[63] In 2025, figures from the Financial Ombudsman Service showed that Revolut topped the fintech industry for the most complaints.[64]
In April 2025, Revolut obtained the Prepaid Payment Instruments (PPIs) licence from the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), to offer payment solutions including pre-paid cards.[65]
In May 2025, Revolut announced that it plans to invest $1.1 billion over the next three years to expand in France and made Paris its Western European headquarters, at the Choose France summit.[66][67]
In June 2025, Revolut announced its plans to acquire Cetelem Argentina, an Argentina-based lender, from BNP Paribas. Terms were not disclosed.[68] The same month, Béatrice Cossa-Dumurgier (a former board member of Société Générale and executive at BNP Paribas) was appointed CEO of Revolut's Western Europe headquarters, based in Paris.[69] In september 2025, it named former Société Générale CEO Frédéric Oudéa as Chairman of its Western Europe hub.[70]
In 2025, Revolut entered discussions with the Bank of Israel to obtain a "lean bank" licence.[71]
In September 2025, Revolut secured in-principle approval for Payments Licence from the UAE.[72]
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Services
Personal and business banking
Revolut offers banking services including GBP and EUR bank accounts, debit cards, credit cards, currency exchange with over 25 fiat currencies, stock trading, cryptocurrency exchange and peer-to-peer payments.[73] Revolut's mobile app supports spending and ATM withdrawals in 120 currencies and transfers in 36 currencies.[74][75] Similar multi-currency features are available from competing fintech companies. Revolut's credit card is available in Poland, Lithuania, the United States, and Ireland.[76] Crypto cannot be deposited or spent, only converted back to fiat inside Revolut. Additionally, Revolut banks with Metropolitan Commercial Bank of New York, which does not allow the transfer of fiat money to or from cryptocurrency exchanges.[77]
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Criticism and controversies
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Revolut has been subject to criticism and many controversies in the past, such as issues with customer support and long-lasting lockouts,[78] as well as anti–money laundering compliance failures,[79] lack of support for defrauded customers,[80][81] and even claims of ties to the Russian government[82] which the company strongly denied.[83]
Employment practices
In March 2019, Wired published an exposé of the company's employment practices and work culture. They found evidence of unpaid work, high staff turnover and employees feeling the need to work weekends to meet performance indicators.[84] A later article in December 2019 by Sifted noted that Revolut had a higher rating than its peers on Glassdoor.[85]
In June 2020, Wired published a further exposé of Revolut's dismissal of employees during the COVID-19 pandemic, in which employees, particularly in Kraków, were given the choice of being terminated for underperformance or a mutual agreement to leave the company voluntarily, to reduce the headline number of 62 redundancies announced by Revolut. The report said "Current and former Revolut employees say staff were coerced into accepting terminations, even though the company had no legal grounds to fire them" and that employees in Porto were pressured into agreeing to a salary sacrifice scheme to keep their jobs. According to Wired, in a message sent to the 495-strong customer support team on Slack soon after the salary sacrifice scheme was announced, head of Support Inna Grynova urged them to participate.[86]
Automated suspension of accounts (2020)
Revolut, like traditional financial institutions, uses algorithms to identify money laundering, fraud, and other criminal activity. Under certain anti–money laundering legislation, if suspicious activities are being investigated, bank staff are not allowed to tell customers why their accounts have been frozen.[87]
It has been reported since 2020 that Revolut's algorithms suspended accounts for weeks or months at a time after unusual activity was detected.[88][89] Revolut's policies require customers whose accounts were suspended to request a resolution via in-app chat support.[90][89][88] Revolut said that "the system is programmed to temporarily lock an account and place it in a queue, until one of our compliance agents can review the case".[91]
In February 2020, The Daily Telegraph reported that Revolut suspended an account containing £90,000 for more than two months[92] and that another customer travelled 500 miles from Auvergne in France to Revolut's London offices in an unsuccessful attempt to recover £15,000 in an account that Revolut had frozen with no justification given.[93] The account was later closed and the money in it returned to the customer's other bank accounts.[93]
Also in February 2020, The Times reported that Revolut suspended and later closed a business account containing €300,000 belonging to Priorité Energie, an energy transition start-up company, preventing the company from paying its staff.[94] Revolut publicly apologised and eventually rectified the problem.[94]
There were further reports in 2021 of Revolut withholding clients' funds.[95]
UK fraud victims
In 2023, Revolut reported a 35% reduction in authorised push payment fraud.[96] However, the company remained one of the most frequently named financial institutions in UK fraud complaints, prompting scrutiny of its security measures.[97] The number of complaints of fraud reported to Action Fraud, the UK reporting centre for fraud and cybercrime, by Revolut customers rose from 567 in February 2023 to 1,086 for February 2024.[80]
Prior to Revolut having a banking license, complaints were made by defrauded Revolut customers to the Financial Ombudsman, who in some cases required Revolut to reimburse and compensate victims, and remove fraud markers wrongly placed against the individuals.[98]
Many financial service customers in the UK have been subject to fraud, but Revolut has been involved in more cases than any major High Street bank, and has a reputation for not reimbursing victims, which full banks are more likely to do. Action Fraud received 10,000 reports of fraud naming Revolut in 2023, 2,000 more than Barclays, one of the UK's largest banks, and twice as many as a competitor bank of similar size to Revolut. That year over 3,500 complaints about Revolut were made to the ombudsman, more than any other financial institution. Consumer organization Which? did not recommend banking large sums of money with Revolut, saying "They have a track record of not reimbursing people who fall victim to fraud or find themselves in this incredibly difficult situation, [and] of money being taken from accounts even after scam activity has been reported."[99]
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Sponsorship
In January 2025, Manchester City W.F.C. announced Revolut as the training sleeve kit sponsor.[100]
In July 2025, Audi F1 Team announced a multi-year deal with Revolut to be the title sponsor of the team.[101]
See also
References
External links
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