Guillaume Pousaz, CEO and founder of payment platform Checkout.com, speaking at the annual Web Summit technology conference in Lisbon, Portugal, in 2022.
Horacio Villalobos | Getty Images
LONDON — Fintech unicorn Checkout.com is giving staff a way of cashing in their shares: buying them out.
The London-headquartered payments platform said Friday that it plans to launch a share buyback initiative for employees to “provide them with a path to liquidity.”
The share buyback program is based on a new internal valuation of $12 billion, Checkout.com said. Although internal, the valuation marks a significant drop from its last fundraising round — Checkout.com was valued at $40 billion in a $1 billion funding round in 2022.
The company previously lowered its internal valuation to $11 billion in 2022, and then again to $9.35 billion in 2023. Checkout.com says it regularly monitors the value for its employees in its share incentive program.
The fintech competes with payment service providers such as Stripe, Adyen and PayPal. The company processes billions of dollars in transactions every year for the likes of eBay, IKEA and Sainsbury’s.
Such share sales have proven an increasingly popular way for startups to offer longtime employees and other investors liquidity, particularly as tech companies stay private for longer amid a multi-year decline in initial public offerings.
Checkout.com says it is now on track to exceed a target of 30% core net revenue growth this year and is forecasting $300 billion in annual e-commerce payment volume.
“We are relentlessly focused on growth and innovation, particularly with the impact of AI and the expected rise of agentic commerce,” said Guillaume Pousaz, the company’s CEO and founder, in a press release.
Several other private fintechs have opted to allow employees to sell shares in recent months.
In February, Stripe announced a tender offer allowing early investors and employees to sell shares at a valuation of $91.5 billion. Revolut, meanwhile, earlier this month offered staff the chance to sell shares on the secondary market at a $75 billion valuation.
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