Wealthsimple has been valued at $10 billion after raising $750 million in its latest equity round, placing it among Canada’s most valuable startups. The funding was co-led by Dragoneer Investment Group and Singapore’s GIC, with participation from the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board and Power Corp. of Canada.
BNN Bloomberg spoke with Michael Katchen, chief executive officer at Wealthsimple, about how the funding supports the company’s growth strategy, plans for innovation, and ambitions to eventually go public.
Key Takeaways
- Wealthsimple raised $750 million in an equity round valuing it at $10 billion.
- The funding was co-led by Dragoneer Investment Group and Singapore’s GIC, with participation from major institutional investors.
- The company recently surpassed $100 billion in assets under management, doubling its total from last year.
- CEO Katchen said Wealthsimple plans to expand its product offerings and explore in-person service options.
- Katchen confirmed the company still plans to go public in the future, though no timeline has been set.
Read the full transcript below:
MERELLA: Wealthsimple raised three-quarters of a billion dollars in its latest equity round. It’s now valued at $10 billion, so let’s talk to the CEO of Wealthsimple about this. Michael Katchen joins us now. Thanks for your time.
MICHAEL: Thanks for having me.
MERELLA: So what will this new investment be used for?
MICHAEL: Well, Wealthsimple has been doing incredibly well recently. We just announced we had reached $100 billion in total assets. Business is growing really fast, and we felt that it was important that our balance sheet reflect the scale of our ambitions — to bring even more innovation and better financial products to our clients.
MERELLA: OK, so give me an example of what that looks like — the innovation, the financial products.
MICHAEL: We’ve expanded our product suite pretty dramatically in the last number of years. You know, we started in wealth management, expanded to discount brokerage, and just earlier this year we announced the end of banking with a whole suite of banking services. So we’ve gone really broad in what we offer, and now we continue to go even deeper, adding more sophisticated and advanced features across the board to make sure we have the very best financial products on the market.
MERELLA: OK, so Michael, the Canadian Pension Board has now invested. Did they invest before?
MICHAEL: This was their first investment, and we’re very excited about what that means — to actually, indirectly, have every Canadian pensioner who’s a member of the CPP become a shareholder of Wealthsimple through that partnership.
MERELLA: OK, let’s talk about, as you mentioned, $100 billion under management at this point. What do you hear from clients about why people are coming on board?
MICHAEL: I think what you’re seeing behind the momentum in our business is Canadians are ready for a better way of doing their finances — something that is simple, straightforward, seamless and fast, and, dare I say, even delightful. I think we’ve raised expectations of what Canadians have for their financial partners. You’re seeing people moving in droves to run their finances in a better way, and we’re now offering that from everything from wealth management to everyday banking and tax filing. You’re seeing millions of Canadians choose to partner with Wealthsimple for that better financial future.
MERELLA: Do you have physical properties? I’m wondering if customers who do want to meet in person have that ability.
MICHAEL: We don’t have a branch network today, and that’s one of the ways we deliver a lower-cost experience to our clients. We’re aware that clients are interested in more physical opportunities to engage with us, and it’s something we’re exploring.
MERELLA: OK, because I’m wondering — for those who haven’t joined the group trusting in the online system, they might want to talk to somebody face to face or feel more comfortable doing that. So you’re saying there could be plans for that growth in this company?
MICHAEL: Absolutely. And I think it’s important for people to know that often, people look at us as a technology-driven company, but they don’t always appreciate that there are real humans behind the company too. We take great pride in making our team of client service professionals and financial advisors available to clients, either by phone, chat or even video chat, to engage on financial planning and advice. You can absolutely reach human beings at Wealthsimple, and we plan to bring that even more to a physical experience in the future.
MERELLA: Do you find that most of your clients are younger?
MICHAEL: It’s evolved a lot. You can imagine when we started the business 11 years ago, most of our clients eager to adopt an online investment service were younger. But today, we cover clients across the spectrum. Our fastest-growing client segments are increasing in age every year. We doubled the number of clients with $100,000 or more with us in the last year. We tripled the number with half a million or more, and quadrupled the number with a million or more. As Wealthsimple has grown in reputation and scale, people are moving meaningful assets to Wealthsimple and choosing it as their primary financial partner.
MERELLA: So the Bank of Canada’s second-in-command called Canada’s banking system an oligopoly. What’s it like to compete?
MICHAEL: It’s no surprise that Canada hasn’t had the most competitive financial services market historically, and we’re pretty eager to see that change. We’ve been vocal about how competition in this industry drives down fees, improves the experience and makes things better for consumers — which is what we really obsess about: how to deliver a better financial experience and lower fees every day. We’re big believers that more competition is a good thing.
MERELLA: Michael, you mentioned at one point going public — that’s part of the longer-term plan. When are you hoping to do that?
MICHAEL: That is our ultimate ambition, to take the business public someday. We have no update on the timing for that, so no timing announced so far.
MERELLA: OK, let’s also talk about where you see the most opportunity in the banking industry right now.
MICHAEL: Continuing to do what we’ve focused on for the last 10 years — how do you make the best, most high-quality financial products accessible to everybody? Use technology to bring down the cost. Use new technologies like AI to make it even more accessible and delightful. That’s what we’re focused on every day: how to make this industry, which hasn’t always been easy to transact with, feel like any other product we use daily — seamless, quick and delightful. We plan to bring that same experience to every component of your financial life.
MERELLA: Can you give me some insight into how you use AI and how you plan to use it going forward?
MICHAEL: We’re very excited about AI. Just this last week, we had a huge event called Wealthsimple Presents: For Nerds Only, where we talked about how we’re reinventing the investment experience in Canada. We introduced our AI research product — really an AI assistant to help people doing investment research, managing portfolios and automating those portfolios — and the reception from clients has been phenomenal. We’re very excited to release that product, and we have lots more in the works using AI to give clients more support as they do their own research or implement strategies.
MERELLA: OK, so would that AI give stock picks, or would it just give existing research documents to an investor?
MICHAEL: Think of it more like a research assistant. So, if you’re interested in learning more about a trend or what you might have Googled before, you can now ask the AI to run research or analysis for you and give you a simple, digestible answer or a table to better contextualize the questions you’re asking.
MERELLA: Interesting. All right, Michael Katchen, I’ve got to leave it there, sir. I’m out of time, but thank you for your time. I appreciate you joining us today on The Close.
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This BNN Bloomberg summary and transcript of the Oct. 28, 2025 interview with Michael Katchen are published with the assistance of AI. Original research, interview questions and added context was created by BNN Bloomberg journalists. An editor also reviewed this material before it was published to ensure its accuracy and adherence with BNN Bloomberg editorial policies and standards.
