Molten Ventures shares surge as it offloads Revolut stake

Shares in Molten Ventures surged on Tuesday morning after the startup investor confirmed it had sold down its stake in Revolut.

The FTSE 250 firm said it made £63m from the share sale, adding that it still had a stake in the company worth more than £100m following the disposal. 

Molten was an early investor in Revolut and has been gradually selling down its stake in the London fintech since its valuation rocketed to become Europe’s most valuable fintech.

Molten chief executive Ben Wilkinson told City AM: “We look at where the commercial traction of where the business is against where the valuation is.

“If we feel that we’re getting some kind of valuation ahead of the commercial traction, and also thinking about portfolio management, we’ve sold down.

“I think we’re quite happy holding it where we are for a period of time and just seeing so we might hold some through an IPO but we certainly don’t want to have an overexposure to one asset.”

Revolut is reportedly eyeing a secondary share sale with a fresh valuation of $115bn (£86bn). The fintech is understood to be targeting 2028 for an IPO.

Molten sees portfolio boost

It comes as Molten Ventures said it saw the value of its portfolio climb 13 per cent in a year to £1.5bn.

Since then, another of its portfolio startups, Finnish microsatellite firm ICEYE, has seen its valuation rocket to €10bn (£8.6bn), after completing a €450m funding round, boosting the value of Molten’s stake in the business by more than £200m.

Molten Ventures shares soared 10.6 per cent to 595p on Tuesday morning. The stock is up by around a fifth since the start of the year.

“We…continue to see compelling opportunities in areas such as AI infrastructure, space and dual-use technologies,” Wilkinson said.

“The opportunity to build Molten into the leading platform for European venture capital has never been clearer.”