The company says that customers have saved USD 160 million in foreign exchange fees compared to a traditional bank account (GBP 120 million). The startup tries to match the interbank rates as much as possible and charges 0.5% on transaction if the customer doesn`t have a premium account and exchange more than GBP 5,000/EUR 5,000 per month.
Revolut also applies a small 0.5% to 1% markup when forex markets are closed during the weekend. This is still a lot cheaper than using a regular bank account to initiate an international transfer.
When the customers use Revolut’s card to pay abroad, the company also uses the same foreign exchange structure, which is much cheaper than traditional foreign transaction fees.
More interestingly, Revolut is currently acquiring between 3,000 and 3,500 new users every day, and it is accelerating. Three months ago, Revolut only got half as many new signups per day. In total, users have made 42 million transactions, representing USD 6.1 billion.
According to the company, 42% of the user base is aged between 25 and 35 and 500,000 of them are based in the UK. 150,000 users live in France, 60,000 customers are in the Baltics. Finally, Germany and Ireland have over 50,000 users each. And then there are 200,000 users based in other countries across Europe.
Revolut has recently hired small local teams in key markets to work on user acquisition and growth. But that’s just step one as Revolut plans to expand to the US, Singapore, Hong Kong, Australia and New Zealand in early 2018.
More than that, Revolut announced it has applied for a European banking license. The startup is also working on Apple Pay, Android Pay, a travel insurance and the ability to buy shares, bonds and cryptocurrencies.
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