Nubank in Early Talks to Buy Monzo at Up to £10 Billion

Nu Holdings, the New York-listed parent of Brazil's Nubank, is in early-stage talks to acquire Monzo in a deal that could value the British challenger bank at £8 billion to £10 billion — up to 2.2 times the £4.5 billion Monzo carried after its October 2024 secondary share sale. Sky News reported the approach on Saturday; Bloomberg and Reuters confirmed talks over the weekend. It would be one of the largest cross-border fintech deals ever done — and it would end any near-term hope of a London listing for one of Britain's best-known consumer banks.

A three-way race for Monzo's future

Monzo's board and shareholders are effectively weighing three paths, not one. The headline option is a sale to Nu Holdings, the New York-listed parent of Brazil's Nubank, which Sky News reported on Saturday has approached the British bank. Talks are early-stage, with Monzo hiring Morgan Stanley and Qatalyst Partners to advise and the outline terms of a deal said to be under negotiation. The consideration would likely combine cash and Nu stock, according to banking sources cited by Sky. The second path keeps Monzo independent: a fresh funding round expected to value the company above £8 billion, with the proceeds earmarked for expansion into mainland Europe. And on Sunday, Sky News added a third wrinkle — Advent International, the buyout firm that recently explored a $53 billion bid for PayPal, is one of several private equity firms to have held initial talks about taking a minority shareholding in Monzo, an option bankers said only works if the Nu talks stall.

The £10 billion arithmetic

The reported range is striking against Monzo's last formal valuation: £4.5 billion from an employee secondary share sale in October 2024, when Singapore's GIC and StepStone bought in. A £10 billion price would be more than double that mark in under two years. The numbers since justify the leap. For the year ended March 31, 2026, Monzo's revenue grew 39% to £1.7 billion, statutory pre-tax profit rose 44% to £87.3 million, adjusted pre-tax profit reached £172.6 million, deposits climbed to £25.7 billion, and the bank added about three million customers to reach 15.2 million — a customer base since reported to have passed 16 million. Simple division gives 4.7 to 5.9 times Monzo's latest annual revenue at the £8 to £10 billion range. Bloomberg's version of the numbers puts the dollar conversion at about $10.8 billion to $13.5 billion.

What São Paulo buys in London

For Nubank, Monzo offers something it cannot easily build: a UK banking licence, a 16-million-customer deposit franchise in one of the world's most developed banking markets, and — via Monzo's Irish banking licence and its early launches in Ireland and Spain — a ready-made route into continental Europe. Nubank has grown up entirely in the Americas: about 139 million customers at the end of June, almost 118 million of them in Brazil, plus Mexico and Colombia, where the group's second-quarter net income topped $1 billion for the first time. It has no presence in the UK or Europe beyond a large tech and engineering facility in Berlin, and Monzo would immediately put it across the table from Revolut on Revolut's home turf. Monzo itself closed the book on America earlier this year, winding down its US operations to concentrate on the UK and Europe — which is where any fresh capital would go.

London loses another listing

A sale would also land as a second piece of bad news: London had been counting Monzo as one of its flagship future listings. Treasury officials met Monzo and other fintech executives in 2025 in an effort to revive the London market, and reports in May 2025 had the bank lining up bankers for a potential £6 billion London IPO. A Nu deal takes the bank out of the pipeline entirely, just as Revolut is weighing New York alongside London for any eventual listing. The UK government has spent years courting major technology and financial-services flotations; this weekend it watched one of its best prospects go into sale talks with a São Paulo acquirer.

Watching Monday

Neither company has confirmed anything. Monzo declined to comment, while Nu Holdings repeated its policy of not commenting on rumours or speculation. Shares of Nu (NYSE: NU) fell 0.6% in premarket trading Monday, according to market reports, as investors weighed a cross-border bank deal that would stretch the fintech's footprint far beyond Latin America. The caveats here are load-bearing: the talks are early-stage, no agreement has been reached, and £10 billion is the top of a reported valuation range, not an agreed purchase price — the precise price, Sky reported, has not been determined.