NerdWallet Signs $120M Deal for On The Barrelhead

Financial guidance firm NerdWallet is acquiring consumer debt robo-advisor platform On the Barrelhead for approximately $120 million, consisting of roughly $70 million in cash and $50 million in NerdWallet Class A common stock, according to a Thursday (June 23) press release.

Headquartered in Colorado and co-founded in 2017 by CEO Sam Yount, Tim Calkins, and Joseph Fahr, On the Barrelhead is a data-driven platform that provides consumers and small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs) with credit-driven product recommendations by intelligently matching customer credit information with financial partner data.

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“Our vision for a trusted financial ecosystem means we’re able to provide consumers and SMBs with a trusted platform to learn about various financial topics, shop for products, connect their data and receive data-driven nudges,” NerdWallet CEO and Co-founder Tim Chen said in the announcement.

“On the Barrelhead’s data and technology solutions will help us advance toward our goal by enabling us to leverage consumer information to provide users with relevant financial guidance and more personalized and compelling product recommendations,” Chen said.

NerdWallet was co-founded in 2009 by Chen and Jake Gibson, former COO, and is headquartered in Silicon Valley. The company strives to provide trustworthy and knowledgeable financial information to help people make smart money moves.

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On the Barrelhead was founded with a goal to help consumers and SMBs understand and navigate their loan options to improve their finances. Their platform provides consumers and SMBs with highly personalized credit recommendation

“Finding trustworthy guidance and recommendations on how to access capital and consolidate debt is hard to come across for consumers and SMBs,” said On the Barrelhead CEO Yount.

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Becoming part of NerdWallet will help “our users to optimize their finances,” Yount added.

The acquisition expands NerdWallet’s footprint into new financial categories and geographies. It also reinforces the company’s ability to integrate vertically, which it “showed with its successful acquisition of Fundera,” according to the release.