Wise plc
Explore Wise
Core profile pages, annual revenue records, and related research hubs for this company.
Wise plc
Explore Wise
Core profile pages, annual revenue records, and related research hubs for this company.
Company History
Founded 2011 in London, United Kingdom
Wise began in 2011 as TransferWise after Kristo Kaarmann and Taavet Hinrikus looked for a cheaper way to move money between the United Kingdom and Estonia. The company rebranded to Wise in 2021 to reflect its expansion beyond one-off transfers.
Kristo Käärmann is the co-founder and CEO of Wise plc. Born in Estonia, he moved to London where he worked as a management consultant specializing in financial services modernization. His personal experience of losing approximately $635 in exchange rate markups on a $12,700 transfer to Estonia motivated him to build a transparent alternative to traditional banking. Käärmann's operational philosophy emphasizes doing unscalable things first—manually recording transfers in spreadsheets at launch—to validate demand before building automation. Under his leadership, Wise has grown from a six-person team processing $1 million in monthly volume to an 8,000-person organization moving $184.4 billion annually. He was selected as one of the World Economic Forum's Technology Pioneers in 2015. In June 2022, the UK Financial Conduct Authority included Käärmann on its list of individuals receiving penalties for a deliberate tax default regarding $914,400 for the 2017-2018 tax year; he remained on the list for 12 months starting September 2021. Despite this controversy, he has retained the CEO position and led the company's 2025 announcement of a planned primary listing move to the United States.
Taavet Hinrikus is the co-founder of Wise plc and was its first CEO. An Estonian entrepreneur, he joined Skype as its first employee in 2003 and later served as director of strategy, giving him firsthand experience in building peer-to-peer infrastructure that undercuts incumbents. After leaving Skype, Hinrikus worked as an angel investor and advisor to multiple startups before co-founding TransferWise with Kristo Käärmann in January 2011. His personal need to convert euros to pounds for London living expenses—and Käärmann's opposite need—created the peer-to-peer matching concept that became Wise's core innovation. Hinrikus was widely cited as the initial draw for investors, with his Skype pedigree providing credibility in a market where European fintech disruption was unprecedented. He served as CEO until 2017, when he handed the role to Käärmann to focus on investing. He remained chair until July 2022. In 2023, Hinrikus was ranked 197th on The Sunday Times Rich List with a net worth of $1,093 million, making him one of Estonia's first billionaires alongside Käärmann.
Kristo Kaarmann and Taavet Hinrikus found TransferWise in London to reduce hidden bank FX markups.
The company expands beyond one-off transfers into multi-currency account functionality.
TransferWise becomes Wise and completes a London direct listing as its product set moves beyond transfers.
Wise announces its intention to move the primary listing to the United States while retaining a London presence.
Wise reports FY2026 net revenue of $2.5028B and income before tax of $660.4M.
Wise becomes primarily listed on Nasdaq under ticker WSE while retaining LSE ticker WISE as a secondary listing.
Wise reports 17.7M active customers and $57.7B in cross-border volume in Q1 FY2027.
Wise has relied more on building local payment rails and regulatory licenses than on major acquisitions.
Broaden the investor base and align the company with U.S. fintech and technology market peers.
Wise traces its origins to 2011.
The 2021 rebrand from TransferWise to Wise marked the shift from transfer app to broader global money platform.
Wise grew by pairing lower-cost payment infrastructure with transparent pricing, then expanding into accounts, cards, business tools, platform APIs, and public-market access.
This Wise profile covers founding, leadership, financials, and current strategic context.