Payments firm Stripe explores investment round led by Thrive

Digital payments outfit Stripe is having negotiations on a potential investment round led by venture capital firm Thrive Capital, Bloomberg has reported citing a person privy to the development.

If finalised, the deal will see some of the veteran employees of Stripe divesting their shares irrespective of the timeline of the company’s plan to go public.

Stripe could receive $1bn of funding from Thrive through a larger investment round that would value the company between $55bn and $60bn, added the unnamed person.

The valuation is much lesser than the $95bn valuation obtained by Stripe in its latest funding round held in 2021.

According to several reports, Stripe recently cut various positions and reduced its internal valuation a number of times, with the most recent being $63bn.

Last week, Reuters reported that Stripe had tapped American banks Goldman Sachs and JP Morgan to examine the prospect of a public listing.

With the move, Stripe also intends to enable employees to cash out stakes in the firm.

Representatives from both Stripe and Thrive refused to give any detail over the matter.

The latest development comes shortly after Reserve Bank of India (RBI) asked Stripe and two other payments firms to halt their merchant onboarding process.

The apex bank had directed the firms to hold the process until they receive their final payment aggregator (PA) licence.