According to Bloomberg, Rapyd Financial Network is seeking to raise $300 million in a fresh round of funding, which would put the global payments platform’s worth at $3.5 billion—a significant drop from its 2021 valuation of almost $9 billion.
The London-based business provides several financial services that third parties can access through an API, including payments, mobile wallets, money transfers, card issuance, and fraud protection.
Rapyd intends to purchase a payment processing startup using the money. The nine-year-old business has been acquiring businesses lately, most recently Valitor, a payments startup based in Iceland, which it acquired for $100 million in 2022. Additionally, in 2023, it spent $610 million acquiring units of the international payments network PayU.
As of 2023, Rapyd was “in [the] final stages of closing a new financing round of $700 million,” according to CEO and co-founder Arik Shtilman, who spoke with TechCrunch. It is unknown if the funding was obtained and, if so, at what valuation because the company did not make the fundraising round public.
The payments behemoth Stripe, Rapyd’s rival, had to raise money that year at a $50 billion value, down from its peak of $95 billion.
Rapyd would have plenty of company if it were to finish its round at a lower valuation than when it peaked. A down round is a practice used by numerous firms, including Stripe, to raise money at lower values than their prior financings.
The reason for this is that during the 2020 and 2021 VC financing craze, valuations were unreasonably high. According to PitchBook data, flat or down rounds reached a ten-year high, accounting for 27% of all deals in the first nine months of 2024.
Coatue, Oak HC/FT, Target Global, and Tiger Global Management are among the company’s supporters. A request for comment from Rapyd was not immediately answered.
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