Revolut, the app-based global bank from the UK that lets people spend, save, invest and send money abroad from their phone, is now valued at $115 billion, about R1.9 trillion. That is 53% more than a year ago, after investors including Coatue, T. Rowe Price and Baillie Gifford bought shares from existing shareholders. The sale brought no new money into the company.

Revolut started in London in 2015 as an app for sending money and exchanging currency cheaply, and grew into a full financial services platform. Customers can open an account and card in minutes, hold and convert many currencies at low fees, send money internationally, save, and invest, with free and paid plans. It now has more than 80 million retail customers in over 40 countries, and in 2025 it made revenue of $ 6 billion, about R99 billion, with a 38% profit margin.

This year it launched banks in the UK, Mexico, Australia and New Zealand, secured licences in France, Colombia and Argentina, and won conditional approval for a US bank it plans to open in the first half of 2027. Its business accounts, launched in 2017, now bring in about a fifth of its gross profit, serving more than 800,000 companies, and it wants to reach a million by 2027.

Revolut has applied for a banking licence in South Africa and is aiming to launch here by 2028, and it should have a stock market listing by that time too. South Africa would be its first market in Africa. Revolut submitted its application for a full banking licence to the Reserve Bank's Prudential Authority on 14 November 2025, and appointed former African Bank chief executive Dr Gaby Magomola as chair of Revolut South Africa.

Jacques Meyer, who leads its local operations, said in June that its South African waitlist was approaching 100,000 people. It plans to launch with a zero-fee account once it has approval. Applications of this kind usually take 18 to 24 months.

TechCrunch's Jagmeet Singh reported the share sale and Revolut's plans for a US bank and more business banking markets. BusinessTech reported the 2028 South African target and Meyer's comment on the waitlist. TechCentral argued that Revolut's best opening here is foreign currency, because most South Africans already have their home loans, car finance and business accounts with the big banks.

We flagged Revolut's application in an edition last year, and the company it is bringing here is now worth more than R1.9 trillion and profitable. That changes how seriously local banks should take it. Its strongest pitch to South Africans is likely to be cheap foreign currency and international payments, which are expensive and clunky here, though exchange controls limit how far it can go.

The proposed easing of rules for managing offshore money could help on that front. On everyday banking, it would face a crowded field of no-fee digital banks that already have millions of customers, and big banks that hold most people's credit.

For South African fintechs, Revolut's arrival is both a threat and a benchmark. It shows what a single app that people genuinely like can become in ten years. Like Kuunda's secondary sale, this round also let early backers cash out without the company raising new money.

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