The Revolut neobank is discreet. Its banking offer has not changed much for a year and its customer portfolio seems fairly stable, below the 2 million mark in France. British society does not make much noise. And yet, something is brewing. Its ambitions in cryptocurrencies have been heightened. Movements, here and there, draw the silhouette of a major project.
In 2020 and 2021, the establishment benefited greatly from its cryptocurrency exchange functionality. In addition to helping it acquire new customers, the neobank also took the opportunity to find an even more efficient source of income than its bank cards. It only lasted a while – the cryptocurrency winter froze an entire market and wiped out players – but Revolut is hanging on and believing.
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Things are happening at Revolut
Each week its little information. Since the beginning of the year, the internal teams have been agitated. We were treated to the arrival of new tokens (for a total of 80 crypto-currencies available), the arrival of transfers between wallets, full ownership of assets, but also reduced fees on Premium and Metal cards. However, all this seems to be only the beginnings of a bigger project.
First, Revolut is hiring. The company plans to increase the size of its teams specialized in crypto-currencies 20% over the next six months. This will concern both its offices in Europe, in London but also in the United States. And the positions sought are representative of the preparation of something big. In all, 230 positions are currently to be filled (for the tip of the iceberg).
The profiles sought by Revolut:
- Software engineers
- Specialized lawyers
- Financial Compliance Experts
Everything seems to be converging towards the project of launching a Revolut cryptocurrency. The token could be called “Revcoin”, as neobank co-founder Nik Storonsky gave valuable details to reporters from The Block last May. The rumor dates back to September 2021, and it is almost certain that it would not be a stablecoin but a token subject to fluctuations, supposed to reward Revolut customers.
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Its main cousin, to compare it, would be Binance’s BNB. It is no wonder that the company took inspiration from the cryptocurrency of the number 1 trading platform in the world. At the Finance Festival last April in London, Revolut already revealed that 100 people among its teams “currently working in cryptos and web3”. On this occasion, Nik Storonsky was very clear in his words:
“For us, cryptocurrencies are a fully-fledged financial services vertical, which is obviously growing very rapidly with many interesting applications being built on the web3. So obviously we’d like to be part of that and we have a lot of exciting projects that we can’t share yet.”
A Revolut crypto-bank
During the month of August, in the middle of vacation for many people, it was in Cyprus that the continuation of Revolut’s secret plan took shape. The neobank received approval of a new license of the Cyprus Securities and Exchange Commission (CySEC) to be able to offer products and services with reference to cryptocurrencies and digital assets more broadly. Revolut would therefore be on its way to becoming a true autonomous crypto-currency trading platform with much more complete possibilities on European soil.
This is how Revolut could seek to plug holes in its banking services by capitalizing on decentralized DeFi solutions. It could, for example, be loan solutions in cryptocurrencies, as Aave also does (the company behind the protocol also just obtained a strategic European license). In France, Revolut would approach players like Coinhouse, which claims to be a “crypto-bank”. Case to follow.
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