UK-based Atlantic Money, is a new money transfer provider, which has emerged from stealth mode. The company has picked up $4.5 million in seed funding from global VCs.
The round led by Amplo and Ribbit Capital alongside participation from Kleiner Perkins, Index Ventures (invested in ProductBoard and Ascend), Harry Stebbings’ 20VC, Elefund, Day One Ventures and Susa Ventures. Also, Vlad Tenev and Baiju Bhatt, the founders of Robinhood, and Anquan Wang, the founder of Webull invested in the round.
Patrick Kavanagh, Co-Founder of Atlantic Money said: “Unlike our competitors, we are not subsidising costs associated with products and services that our customers have little interest in. It’s a simple pitch – with Atlantic Money all transfers up to £1,000,000 receive the live mid-market currency rate for a flat fixed-fee of £3, delivering savings of up to 99% versus all our competitors.”
Neeraj Baid, Co-Founder of Atlantic Money added: “We set out with the goal of creating a money transfer app for people like me and Patrick who, having moved overseas for work, are sending money back home regularly. We’ve built new technology that links global currencies more efficiently than ever before, substantially reducing transaction costs and offering a friction-free customer experience.”
Harry Stebbings, Managing Partner at 20VC said: “It’s refreshing that Atlantic isn’t building another financial super app with vast product features irrelevant for their target customers – instead, they are laser-focused on eliminating disproportionate fees and margin for people sending large amounts of money abroad, while making the process incomparably simple. There isn’t one other provider today that enables you to send up to £1 million abroad for just £3 with no FX commission. That’s pretty impressive.”
Nick Shalek, General Partner at Ribbit Capital commented: “Patrick, Neeraj and team have deep experience working in fintech. As leaders in the first wave of innovation that has started to change the financial services landscape, they understand the complexities of running regulated, compliant businesses and also the opportunity to use technology to bring greater value to consumers. We’re excited to see them using that expertise to create products that deliver even more transparent and lower-cost financial services in a critical part of the market.”
Brainchild of Robinhood alumni
Atlantic Money was launched by co-founders Neeraj Baid and Patrick Kavanagh (American expats in London), the former employees of popular trading platform Robinhood. Its in-house team comprises executives from Wise, Tinkoff, Monzo, Amazon, Capco and Freetrade. Atlantic Money is authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority as a payment institution. The company has been built to help people send money globally quickly and cost-effectively.
It is bringing institutional pricing to people sending larger amounts of money abroad, thereby dramatically undercutting the pricing model of incumbent providers. The customers who send money using Atlantic Money for the first time can send up to £1 million per transfer while securing the live mid-market current
It has emerged as the 2nd-gen challenger that disrupts Wise, PayPal, and Revolut as the most cost-effective international money transfer provider in the world for over £1K transfers. It offers savings of up to 99% as compared to rivals. Atlantic will cost just £3 per transfer, which is a flat fee with a mid-market exchange rate of 0% FX markup for retail customers to send any amount up to £1 million.
Emerged from stealth mode
Atlantic Money has today emerged from stealth with a mission to bring equality to the global money transfer market. The cost of sending money internationally is fixed per transaction, even when sending large amounts. Yet the incumbent money transfer providers have built businesses dependent on penalising the customers who need them most.
With its launch, Atlantic Money has come up with an end to this. With a friction-free app alongside its technology platform, which cuts the middleman, it directly connects everyday customers to an institutional-grade currency transfer solution. Eventually, the pricing reserved for the banks will be available to regular customers, making the cost of larger transfers with Atlantic Money unparalleled as compared to other money transfer providers out there.
At launch, the app will enable customers to send money from the UK in GBP into 9 currencies including USD, EUR, AUD, CAD, SEK, NOK, DKK, PLN and CZK, with new currency corridors and advanced product features being added continuously post-launch.
