Nubank Goes Public at $41.5B Valuation with LatAm Growth on Horizon 

Brazilian FinTech Nubank’s valuation is up to $41.5 billion — higher than the country’s largest bank, Itaú Unibanco — as its initial public offering (IPO) makes its Wall Street debut, according to a Financial Times report Thursday (Dec. 9). 

That figure makes Nubank, the startup founded in 2013 and backed by Warren Buffett and Tencent, the most valuable listed financial institution in South America. The company raised $2.6 billion this week with the sale of a minority stake. 

The fresh capital will be used to help Nubank expand into Mexico and Colombia, steps it’s taking to expand its reach across Latin America, David Vélez, founder and chief executive, said. 

“There is a lot of opportunity to build the next generation of financial services, so we will continue to invest and grow for a very long time,” he told the Financial Times. 

Nubank started as a no-annual-fee credit card company. It has more than 48 million mobile app-based users for its savings accounts, business loans, insurance and investment products in three countries where mainstream financial offerings have been hard to find. 

Nubank shares are expected to debut at $9, the top of its range, and sell under the ticker symbol NU. 

Vélez told FT that Nubank had been exposed to more market risk than other startups because of its dual listing process. The company also sold Brazilian depositary receipts on São Paulo’s stock exchange, each worth one-sixth of a share. 

Nubank revenue doubled to $1.1 billion through September compared to the same time one year earlier, but its net losses jumped from $64.4 million to $99.1 million.  

Related: Brazil IPOs Have Stalled Since September 

Rising interest rates, a stalling economy and floundering equity markets have squelched dozens of possible Brazilian IPOs in recent months, with none since early September before Nubank’s debut. 

Through the first eight months of the year, 48 Brazil-based companies set a record with 65 billion reals (about $11.5 billion) raised. The slowdown is being blamed on political tension ahead of Brazil’s upcoming presidential election. 

IPOs around the world have raised more than $600 billion this year, but the past several months have seen inflation and the omicron variant of COVID-19 scaring companies away from taking the public plunge.