British digital bank Starling is one of the top UK fintech companies expected to go public in the future. Headquartered in London, UK, Starling offers mobile commercial banking services, same-day payment services, and real-time spending intelligence.
Alongside Starling, UK companies like Revolut and Zopa are also highly anticipated to make their IPO debuts.
Source: Starling Bank Annual Report, Bloomberg, City AM
Founded in 2014, by British female entrepreneur Anne Boden, Starling is considered a rare British “unicorn” in the fintech industry. Boden had a long career in corporate banking, having worked for the British bank Lloyds. Boden stepped down from her leadership role in 2024, with former OVO boss Raman Bhatia taking over to lead the bank's continued expansion.
Starling has no physical branches but is a platform that is accessed primarily via its mobile app and the company’s website. It makes money via subscriptions, interest payments, interchange fees, and other fees such as transfers, overdrafts, referrals, and licensing. Starling is also generating significant revenue through Engine by Starling, its proprietary cloud-native SaaS banking platform that it licenses to other banks globally.
The digital bank gas opened more than 4.6 million accounts, since launching, including more than 400,000 small business accounts. Its total gross lending exceeds £4.8 billion, and deposits top £12.1 billion (source).
Since its inception, Starling has amassed several industry awards. In 2018 it was voted Best British Bank by Smart Money People’s Best British Bank Awards, while in 2021 and 2022 it won The Which? Banking Brand of the year.
The company has also expanded its footprint over the years with offices in Cardiff, London, Manchester, and Southampton.
In 2025 Starling reported a fourth year of profitability, posting a pre-tax profit of £280 million. However, the exact timeline for an IPO remains unclear, as CEO Raman Bhatia has recently stated that a public listing is not an immediate priority and the bank is under no pressure to rush.
Its existing investors include Goldman Sachs, Fidelity Management & Research Company, the Qatar Investment Authority, and billionaire Harald McPike. The company is actively exploring options that could see its valuation reach up to £4 billion.
While a London Stock Exchange (LSE) listing was once the default assumption for the UK-based company, recent reports indicate that top investors have cooled on London due to regulatory frustrations, accelerating Starling’s interest in a US listing.
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An Initial Public Offering (IPO) is an investor’s first chance to gain exposure to an organisation. An IPO is an important milestone for a company looking to raise capital and an opportunity for investors to get involved in a hopefully growing business.
With Axi you can get exposure to Starling IPO as soon as it’s listed on a specific exchange and prices from the exchange become available to our liquidity providers.
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