The Swedish payments startup Trustly is gauging investor interest in an initial public offering (IPO) that could value the company at more than $11 billion. According to a Financial Times report published on Tuesday (March 16), Trustly plans to meet with investors in the coming weeks in hopes of coming to a decision on the IPO and final valuation around the start of April.
Trustly lets consumers pay for goods and services online using their bank accounts instead of card networks, allowing them to give merchants lower fees and cut out middlemen like banks and card issuers.
According to the FT, Trustly was initially aiming for an $8 billion to $11 billion valuation, but then recent funding rounds for competitors Stripe and Klarna tripled their valuations to $95 billion and $31 billion, respectively.
This news came the same day Trustly reported record profits for 2020. In his report to shareholders, CEO Oscar Berglund said the company processed more than SEK 190 billion in transaction volume in 2020 ($22 billion US), a 42 percent increase from 2019. The year also saw Trustly connect 2,500 merchants and 1,400 new banks, while also reaching 55 million new customers, Berglund told shareholders.
“Demand for Trustly’s payment solutions continues to grow, supported by the broad shift from offline to online commerce and consumer preferences moving in favor of account-to-account payments,” he said. The FT noted that Berglund declined to comment on reports about Trustly’s potential IPO.
PYMNTS first reported Trustly’s IPO preparations in January, with Nordic Capital, which acquired Trustly in 2018, working with Goldman Sachs, Carnegie and J.P. Morgan. Sources close to the matter told Reuters that the company could have a value between 6 billion to 9 billion euros. It was part of a larger trend of FinTech IPOs, which became an enticing investment amid rising demand for digital payment services during the COVID-19 pandemic.
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