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Revolut, the fast-growing fintech that has struggled to secure a UK banking licence, now has “Goldman Sachs quality” information systems, according to longtime board member and former Goldman executive Michael Sherwood.
“It’s hard to second guess our regulatory friends,” Sherwood told the Financial Times in his first interview since stepping down as co-head of Goldman Sachs International nine years ago. “But I don’t hear anything that makes me think [the licence] won’t come.”
Thanks in large part to the drive of chief executive Nik Storonsky, Revolut is Britain’s biggest fintech, growing at a rate of up to 3mn new customers a month and with a recent valuation of $75bn.
“He has a grasp of numbers, like almost no one I’ve ever met,” said Sherwood, highlighting the strong performance and “extraordinary ROEs [returns on equity]” of the group, which operates mainly in the foreign exchange and crypto investment sectors.
“I’m not a crypto investor per se,” Sherwood himself confessed.
The former Goldman banker — one of two “big beasts” on the Revolut board, alongside chair Martin Gilbert — admitted the company had experienced “growing pains”. In 2023, BDO, the group’s former auditor, said its 2021 revenues may have been “materially misstated”. It has been trying to get a banking licence since 2021.
Sherwood said the professionalisation of Revolut’s operations and governance was ongoing, with “one or two more” non-executives set to join to satisfy regulatory demands for more boardroom experience.
“They say, ‘well, you need more people with retail banking experience . . . ’ and so you say, ‘well, tell me which retail banks have done a great job’. Every single one of them, whether it’s PPI or car loans, you name it, [there’s been a scandal]. I think Revolut’s a breath of fresh air.”
Sherwood confirmed that once a UK banking licence was obtained, the plan was to proceed quickly with an acquisition in the US, but he played down the importance of such a deal to growth, stressing Revolut’s focus on currency exchange was not a natural fit in the US.
“The US is synonymous with being a mono-currency environment, so there are particular pockets that are interesting to us, like Mexicans who mail money back to Mexico. But I don’t think the US is going to be a massive driver of Revolut going forward.”
He also noted there was no prospect of an IPO for “at least” the next two years.
In a wide-ranging interview, Sherwood called US President Donald Trump a figure of “dread” whose “outcomes are extraordinarily good”. The former fixed-income trader characterised current market conditions as “relatively irrational” and “not dissimilar” to the dotcom bubble of 2000.
More professionalised cyber attacks were the biggest threat to markets, companies and societies, he said, urging collective action by government and businesses to tackle the problem.
He said that the mass adoption of artificial intelligence meant companies such as Revolut were hiring at a slower rate. The technology was doing the equivalent of “thousands of jobs a year”, he added, and could lead to millions of job losses across the economy. That would force governments to enlarge social security nets. And in turn, “some sort of robot technology tax is going to be inevitable for the world”, he concluded.
Reflecting on his time at Goldman, Sherwood praised former chief executive Lloyd Blankfein, while describing current boss David Solomon as “a survivor [who has] done a good job and the stock price has done amazingly . . . I’m a happy shareholder”.
The board seat at Revolut is now Sherwood’s only major finance role, though he is involved in other companies through his portfolio of angel and early-stage investments, managing a personal fortune of close to £200mn, according to the Sunday Times Rich List.
He said he also devoted a lot of energy to Greenhouse Sports, a children’s charity he helped found more than 20 years ago, which runs coaching in table tennis, basketball, tennis and a range of other sports in more than 60 schools with a focus on economic disadvantage.
This weekend, Greenhouse is launching a 36-hour fundraising drive, largely on WhatsApp. The “For Every Future” campaign’s £6mn fundraising target is designed to replenish the charity’s reserves following the £8mn restoration of its London hub, which houses its office and a community centre offering sports sessions.
Sherwood himself is a keen amateur table tennis player and his father played for England. The charity’s 100 staff and 65 coaches-cum-mentors help about 9,000 children a year, focusing on sports and wider life skills. “It’s much more likely that your sports teacher is going to be your life skills mentor than your maths teacher,” said Sherwood. “You get to bond with those people a lot more.”
