Monzo, with its first year of profit behind it, wants to be taken seriously
The British digital bank has enlisted the help of Morgan Stanley ahead of its long-rumored IPO.
The UK doesn’t have a long list of tech giants to trumpet, but one fintech name has reached corporate nirvana. Digital bank Monzo now sits proudly in the pantheon of brands so ingrained in UK culture as to become fully fledged verbs — as in, “I’ll Monzo you for the meal” — with 1 in 5 British adults reportedly using the online bank.
Now, Monzo is getting ready to graduate from successful startup to corporate behemoth. The 10-year-old company is said to be working with US giant Morgan Stanley to meet investors ahead of a long-awaited £6 billion IPO that could come as soon as the start of next year — though which side of the Atlantic the listing will land on is still up for debate.
Growing up
While its bright colorful cards, cavalier use of emojis, app-first approach, and budgeting tools have worked well to make the app-based bank popular with younger customers, CEO TS Anil is at pains to point out that Monzo’s demographic is shifting. At a recent talk in London with TechCrunch, the industry veteran announced that the median age of its customer base is now 34, adding that the bank even has “hundreds of customers” in their 90s, as well.
The business itself is maturing, too, having posted its first year of net profit in 2024.
From 2016 to 2023, Monzo racked up more than £575 million in losses. Last year, the bank managed to get into the black for the first time, posting £8.7 million in net profit after it added 2.3 million more customers and revenues leaped 2.5x to £880 million, per its latest annual report.
In the same TechCrunch interview, Anil balked at the idea that Monzo had become a “legacy player” in the space. But with the company reportedly looking to attract more corporate clients, grow its mortgages offering, and expand into traditional products like pensions, it’s hard to see Monzo keeping some of the fun “edge” that helped it get its start.
When faced with the chance of being cool, profitable, and innovative, maybe banks can only pick two.
