Brazil’s Nubank in Talks to Buy Britain’s Monzo, Sky News Reports

BRAZIL · BANKING

Brazil’s Nubank is in talks to buy Monzo, the British digital bank, Sky News reported this weekend. The report values Monzo at between £8 billion and £10 billion, about US$10.6 billion to US$13.2 billion.

Neither bank has confirmed the talks, and no agreement has been announced. If one were struck, it would be the largest purchase of a British bank by a Latin American company.

Nubank co-founder and chief executive David Vélez, who built the bank in São Paulo from 2013 (Photo: Nubank, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons)

What Was Reported

Sky News said the two digital banks have held talks about a deal that would take Monzo into Nubank’s hands. The broadcaster gave a price range rather than an agreed figure, which is normal at this stage.

Talks at this stage often end without a transaction. Neither Nubank nor Monzo commented publicly on the report, and no filing has appeared on either side of the Atlantic.

The range is roughly double Monzo’s last disclosed valuation. An employee share sale in October 2024 valued the bank at £4.5 billion, about US$5.9 billion at the time, Bloomberg reported then.

What Nu Holdings does. Nu Holdings Ltd. provides digital banking platform in Brazil, Mexico, Colombia, the Cayman Islands, and the United States. The company provides spending solutions comprising Nu credit and prepaid card, a digitally enabled card that acts as a credit and a prepaid card; Nubank+ Tier, an evolution of the Nu experience; Ultraviolet credit…

Who Monzo Is

Monzo is a London bank without branches, founded in 2015 and known for its coral-coloured cards. Its accounts for the year to February 2026 showed 15.2 million customers and £25.7 billion of deposits, about US$34 billion.

The bank reported gross profit of £1.0 billion, about US$1.3 billion, and adjusted pre-tax profit of £172.6 million, about US$229 million. On a statutory basis, pre-tax profit was £87.3 million, roughly US$116 million.

Monzo closed its United States operation this year to concentrate on Britain and continental Europe. It has also been preparing for a stock-market listing, which a sale would replace.

Why Nubank Would Want It

Nubank began in São Paulo in 2013 as a credit-card company for customers the big Brazilian banks treated poorly. It now serves more than 110 million people in Brazil, Mexico and Colombia.

Its shares closed on Friday at US$13.59 in New York, which values the company at roughly US$65 billion. That is about five times the top of the range reported for Monzo.

The Brazilian bank has been pushing outside Latin America. It began offering accounts in the United States this year through a partner bank, while it waits on its own American licence application.

Buying Monzo would give it a British banking licence, a European customer base and a brand that does not need translating. It would also remove a competitor in the market for app-only banking.

What Would Have to Happen

A takeover of a British bank needs the blessing of the Prudential Regulation Authority and the Financial Conduct Authority. Regulators examine the buyer’s capital, its owners and its plans for depositors.

Monzo’s shareholders would also have to agree. They include the venture funds Accel and Passion Capital, and CapitalG, the growth-investment arm of Google’s parent company.

Thousands of customers also hold small stakes from the bank’s crowdfunding rounds. They would be asked to vote on any sale, as they were on earlier fundraisings.

Brazilian regulators would take an interest too, because Nubank’s holding company answers to the central bank in Brasília. None of these steps happens quickly, and any of them can stop a deal.

The Direction of Travel

For most of the past century, European banks bought Latin American ones rather than the other way round. Spain’s Santander and Britain’s HSBC built large regional networks that way.

A Nubank purchase of Monzo would point the other way, with Brazilian money buying a British lender. Latin American companies rarely attempt takeovers of that size in Europe.

The region does have precedents in other industries. Brazil’s JBS bought meat plants across Europe and the United States, and 3G Capital took control of Burger King.

Banking is harder, because regulators judge owners as well as prices. That is why the British approval process matters more here than the money does.

What to Watch

The first thing to watch is whether either bank confirms the talks or denies them. A denial would settle the matter for now, while silence usually means the conversation continues.

The second is Monzo’s listing plan, which had pointed to a valuation near £10 billion, about US$13.2 billion. A sale at that level would tell investors what private buyers think the business is worth.

The third is Nubank’s American licence application. Owning a regulated British bank would change how supervisors in Washington read the company’s ambitions.

The fourth is price. Monzo’s board has to weigh a cash exit now against a listing later, and its early backers have waited a decade for either.

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