British fintech Revolut tops billion in profit as revenue jumps 72%

Technology

British fintech Revolut tops $1 billion in profit as revenue jumps 72%

Published

13 hours ago

April 24, 2025

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Revolut CEO Nikolay Storonsky at the Web Summit in Lisbon, Portugal, Nov. 7, 2019.

Pedro Nunes | Reuters

LONDON — British fintech firm Revolut on Thursday announced it topped $1 billion in annual profit for the first time, a major milestone for the company as it readies the launch of its U.K. bank later this year.

Revolut, which offers a range of banking and financial services via an app, said that net profit for the year ending Dec. 31, 2024, totaled £1.1 billion ($1.5 billion), up 149% year over year. Revenues at the company increased 72% year on year to £3.1 billion, driven by growth across different revenue streams.

Revolut’s wealth unit — which includes its stock-trading business — saw outsized growth, with revenue surging 298% to £506 million, while subscriptions turnover jumped 74% to £423 million.

Revolut also saw significant growth in its loan book, which grew 86% to £979 million. Coupled with a jump in customer deposits, this contributed to a 58% increase in interest income, which totaled £790 million.

UK bank rollout

Revolut’s financial milestone arrives at a critical time for the almost decade-old-firm. The digital banking unicorn has been preparing a transition to becoming a fully operational bank in the U.K. after securing a banking license last summer.

It was granted a banking license with restrictions in July 2024 from the U.K.’s Prudential Regulation Authority, bringing an end to a lengthy application process that began back in 2021.

The restricted license means that Revolut is now in the “mobilization” stage, where it is focusing on building out its banking operations and infrastructure in the run-up to a full launch. The period typically lasts about 12 months.

Revolut is still awaiting approval from regulators to transfer all 11 million of its U.K. users to a new banking entity this summer. Once fully up and running, the firm will be able to begin offering loans, overdrafts and mortgages, opening up the path to new income streams.

‘Customers trust banks’

Victor Stinga, Revolut’s chief financial officer, told CNBC on Thursday that the company’s aim is to formally launch its U.K. bank later this year.

“As you can imagine, at this scale, it’s a thorough process, and we just pay a lot of attention to it,” Stinga said. “We work very closely on a close contact with the PRA [Prudential Regulation Authority] and the FCA [Financial Conduct Authority] on it. We feel like we’re making great progress on it.”

Stinga said that a big advantage of becoming a bank in the U.K. is ability to start accepting deposits protected by government guarantees. Licensed banks are covered by the Financial Services Compensation Scheme, which means their customers can claim up to £85,000 if a lender goes out of business.

“Customers trust banks, so it means customers on this transition will use Revolut as a primary bank account,” Stinga said.

Lending is arguably “the biggest roadmap item that this unlocks,” Revolut’s CFO said, adding that the firm is looking at launching credit cards and personal loans, similar to the products it already offers in the European Union under a separate EU banking license.

Francesca Carlesi, Revolut’s U.K. boss, previously told the Wall Street Journal that Revolut views its journey to becoming a U.K. bank as a crucial step in its global expansion and eventual IPO. “My main strategic focus is making Revolut the primary bank for everybody in the U.K.,” she told the WSJ.

It has a steep hill to climb — rivals Monzo and Starling have had a lengthy head start on Revolut. Monzo obtained its full banking license in 2017, while Starling was granted its own permit in 2016.

Technology

Alphabet to report Q1 earnings results after the bell

Published

3 hours ago

April 24, 2025

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Alphabet to report Q1 earnings results after the bell

Alphabet, the parent company of Google and YouTube, is set to report first-quarter earnings after the bell Thursday.

Here’s what analysts are expecting.

Revenue: $89.12 billion, according to LSEG
Earnings per share: $2.01, according to LSEG
YouTube advertising revenue: $8.97 billion, according to StreetAccount
Google Cloud revenue: $12.27 billion, according to StreetAccount
Traffic acquisition costs (TAC): $13.66 billion, according to StreetAccount

Google finds itself at the center of an artificial intelligence arms race where its position may be threatened pending mounting regulation and competition from generative AI companies, including OpenAI and Anthropic. The company is also among those bracing for the potential impact from President Donald Trump‘s tariffs, which could result in a pullback in advertiser spending due to tighter budgets.

Alphabet shares have dropped more than 17% in 2025 so far.

Wall Street is expecting Alphabet to report 10% year-over-year revenue growth for the first quarter, which included a slew of AI announcements, its largest-ever acquisition, cost cuts and regulatory hurdles.

In March, Google released Gemini 2.5, its “most capable” artificial intelligence model suite yet, and Gemma 3, the company’s latest open model. The timing of Gemini 2.5 and Gemma 3 comes after DeepSeek in January released its R1 model, which caused a rift in Silicon Valley after the Chinese startup claimed its AI model was trained at a fraction of the cost of other leading models.

Google AI chief Demis Hassabis told employees at an all-hands meeting in February that he was not worried about DeepSeek and that Google has superior AI technology.

“We’re very calm and confident in our strategy, and we have all the ingredients to maintain our leadership into this year,” Hassabis said, calming concerns from investors and employees alike. He added, however, he thinks the Chinese company is still “something to be taken seriously.”

Google this quarter also announced new personalization features for Gemini, allowing the chatbot to reference users’ search histories, and users can also connect Gemini to other Google apps, including Calendar, Notes, Tasks and Photos.

During the quarter, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang announced it would be partnering with Google’s Gemini products, giving the company high praise.

“No company is better at every single layer of computing than Google and Google Cloud,” Huang said.

Alphabet also had a number of announcements in autonomous driving.

In March, Waymo began offering robotaxi rides in Austin, Texas, through the Uber app and opened up a waitlist in Atlanta. Those markets are just two of several more expected expansions in the U.S. this year.

Alphabet also made its largest acquisition ever in March when it agreed to buy Wiz for $32 billion in cash, almost $10 billion more than it offered for the startup in 2024, and said it expects the deal to close next year, subject to regulatory approvals. With the acquisition, Google will seek to bolster its cloud division’s security offerings. Google is behind Amazon and Microsoft in cloud market share, which may help the company’s argument to obtain regulatory approval.

Google this quarter also faced a slew of regulatory and legal challenges.

Last week, a federal judge ruled that Google held illegal monopolies in online advertising markets due to its position between ad buyers and sellers. The ruling represents a second major antitrust blow for Google. Last August, a judge determined the company has held a monopoly in its core market of internet search.

In April, the company reached a settlement with its employee union, where it agreed to reverse a policy forbidding employees from discussing antitrust litigation. The settlement, which marked a major victory for Google staffers, came ahead of Google’s remedy trial, which will determine the consequences of the search monopoly ruling over the next few weeks.

Education tech company Chegg in February filed a lawsuit against Google. Chegg claimed that Google’s “AI summaries” feature in search have hurt the online education company’s traffic and revenue. Similarly, Reddit in February claimed that Google’s search algorithm caused some “volatility” with user growth in the fourth quarter, but the company’s search-related traffic has since recovered, CEO Steve Huffman said.

WATCH: DOJ targets Google’s AI ambitions in high-stakes antitrust trial

Technology

ServiceNow shares pop 15% on strong earnings, upbeat guidance

Published

3 hours ago

April 24, 2025

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ServiceNow shares pop 15% on strong earnings, upbeat guidance

Bill McDermott, chairman and CEO of ServiceNow, speaks during an interview on the floor at the New York Stock Exchange on Oct. 26, 2023.

Brendan Mcdermid | Reuters

ServiceNow shares surged 15% on stronger-than-expected first-quarter results and an upbeat forecast despite the uncertain macroeconomic environment.

The enterprise technology company posted adjusted earnings of $4.04 per share on $3.09 billion in revenue. That topped a consensus estimate of $3.83 in earnings per share and $3.08 billion in sales, according to LSEG. Revenues grew about 19% from a year ago.

ServiceNow reported net income of $460 million, or $2.20 per share. That is up from $347 million, or $1.67 per share in the year-ago quarter. Current remaining performance obligations reached $10.3 billion, jumping 22% year over year. The company also lifted its full-year forecast.

“While our business remains strong, we are only flowing through part of those benefits into our full‑year outlook” to account for any pending risks from the geopolitical environment, the company said in a release.

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ServiceNow shares spike more than 7% on Q1 beat

Technology

South Korea says DeepSeek transferred user data to China and the U.S. without consent

Published

8 hours ago

April 24, 2025

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South Korea says DeepSeek transferred user data to China and the U.S. without consent

Jaap Arriens | Nurphoto | Getty Images

South Korea’s data protection authority has concluded that Chinese artificial intelligence startup DeepSeek collected personal information from local users and transferred it overseas without their permission.

The authority, the Personal Information Protection Commission, released its written findings on Thursday in connection with a privacy and security review of DeepSeek.

It follows DeepSeek’s removal of its chatbot application from South Korean app stores in February at the recommendation of PICP. The agency said DeepSeek had committed to cooperate on its concerns.

During DeepSeek’s presence in South Korea, it transferred user data to several firms in China and the U.S. without obtaining the necessary consent from users or disclosing the practice, the PIPC said.

The agency highlighted a particular case in which DeepSeek transferred information from user-written AI prompts, as well as device, network, and app information, to a Chinese cloud service platform named Beijing Volcano Engine Technology Co.

While the PIPC identified Beijing Volcano Engine Technology Co. as “an affiliate” of TikTok-owner ByteDance, the information privacy watchdog noted in a statement that the cloud platform “is a separate legal entity and has no relation to ByteDance,” according to a Google translation.

According to PIPC, DeepSeek said it used Beijing Volcano Engine Technology’s services to improve the security and user experience of its app, but later blocked the transfer of AI prompt information from April 10.

DeepSeek and ByteDance did not immediately respond to inquiries from CNBC.

The Hangzhou-based AI startup took the world by storm in January when it unveiled its R1 reasoning model, rivaling the performance of Western competitors despite the company’s claims that it was trained for relatively low costs and with less advanced hardware.

However, the app’s rising popularity quickly triggered national security and data concerns outside China due to Beijing’s requirement for domestic firms to share data with the PRC. Cybersecurity experts have also flagged data vulnerabilities in the app and voiced concerns about the company’s privacy policy.

PIPC on Thursday said it had issued a corrective recommendation to DeepSeek, which includes requests to immediately destroy AI prompt information transferred to the Chinese company in question and to set up legal protocols for transferring personal information overseas.

When the data protection authority announced the removal of DeepSeek from local app stores, it signaled that the app would become available again once the company implemented the necessary updates to comply with local data protection policy.

That investigation followed reports that some South Korean government agencies had banned employees from using DeepSeek on work devices. Other global government departments, including in Taiwan, Australia, and the U.S., have reportedly instituted similar bans.