SoFi Acquires Capital Markets Partner PrimaryBid

PrimaryBid, a U.K. FinTech company that powers retail inclusion in global capital markets, has reportedly been acquired by SoFi Technologies.

A message on PrimaryBid’s website dated Friday (May 8) says: “PrimaryBid’s technology has been acquired by SoFi Technologies Inc, a US-listed financial services company.”

Reached by PYMNTS, a SoFi spokesperson confirmed that SoFi has acquired the assets of PrimaryBid’s directed share program.

Sky News City Editor Mark Kleinman reported in a Monday (May 11) blog post that PrimaryBid was founded in 2016 to aggregate orders from retail investors into a single block and that the company gained prominence during the COVID pandemic when there was a wave of emergency capital raisings.

However, PrimaryBid has since been impacted by a slump in the London market for initial public offerings. Last year, one of its backers, London Stock Exchange Group (LSEG), wrote down the value of its 7.2% stake in the company by 87%, according to the post.

The agreement with SoFi will see PrimaryBid’s independent status ended and most of its assets acquired by SoFi. The two companies already had a partnership agreement, per the post.

When PrimaryBid announced in February 2022 that it had closed a $190 million Series C funding round, PrimaryBid CEO and Co-Founder Anand Sambasivan said in a press release that the company aimed to use technology, data and advocacy to democratize public market offerings.

“Our platform deepens that relationships public companies have with their stakeholders and helps them make their equity and debt offerings more inclusive,” Sambasivan said.

SoFi announced in October 2024 that was collaborating with PrimaryBid to launch a Directed Share Platform (DSP) called DSP2.0 that facilitates equity program management for companies looking to raise capital in the United States.

PYMNTS reported in April that SoFi’s first quarter results showed that the company’s platform strategy resulted in member growth, product adoption and cross-selling to deepen engagement across its ecosystem.

SoFi CEO Anthony Noto said during an April earnings call that the first quarter “clearly demonstrates the effectiveness of our Everything Financial Services app strategy and our ability to build deeper multiproduct relationships with members, which in turn will drive a higher lifetime value.”