Allica Bank is laying the groundwork to expand into the European market after becoming one of the fastest-growing fintech unicorns in the UK.
The small business lender has applied for a banking licence in Sweden initiating its first move into a new market beyond its homeland.
The submission to the Swedish Financial Supervisory Authority, known as Finansinspektionen, follows the firm landing a $155m funding round earlier this year that catapulted it to unicorn status. The cash raise valued the bank at “close to $1.2bn”.
Over the last year, Allica’s loanbook ballooned with around £1.3bn in fresh originations, giving its entire portfolio a 23 per cent uplift to just north of £3bn.
Richard Davies, Allica’s chief executive, previously told the SME market was a “barren wasteland” five to 10 years ago and Allica’s “strategic focus” on the area was key to its growth.
The Times Hundred has named the firm the UK’s fastest growing private company and Sifted dubbed it Europe’s fastest growing start-up.
In the last year, the firm recorded a 23 per cent rise in pre-tax profit at £36.9m, compared to £29.9 million in 2024.
UK fintechs set sights on Europe
The move towards Europe comes after a number of UK’s top fintech firms have shelved their US growth plans and turned to markets closer to home.
Consumer payments platform Zilch acquired Fjord Bank in January in a deal that handed it a European banking licence. The firm’s founder Philip Belamant told it would allow the group to “move really fast” through its European rollout.
Meanwhile, neobank Monzo has dropped its US operations under new boss Diana Layfield, who has sought to focus the fintech’s operations on the European market. The group has set up offices in Barcelona and Madrid with over 50 employees as it seeks to use Spain as a launch pad for European operations.
Allica’s Davies said the bank would not be “taking this step” into Europe “without the proven model” in the UK.
City minister Lucy Rigby said: “The UK is a fintech powerhouse, and I’m fully committed to ensuring it remains a jurisdiction where the world’s most innovative financial services firms choose to start, scale and stay.”