Sweden has more than just Klarna as an internationally relevant payment fintech. But it is known only to insiders. Trustly, a Stockholm-based open-banking specialist has not only a European but also a substantial United States business. „In 2019, we entered the US market with the acquisition of PayWithMyBank and have been present there with online payments ever since“, Chief Revenue Officer (CRO) Jussi Lindberg says in an interview with Börsen-Zeitung.

Trustly, with its specialty in account-to-account payments (A2A), operates in a sector that, after a phase of development, is poised for significant growth. Over the years, the focus has been on building an ecosystem of banking connections necessary for quickly and cost-effectively processing online payments. „Account-to-account payments have long been a big market promise, but the quality of our service for merchants is also strongly dependent on the banking structure in each country. We can only provide merchants with good conversion rates when there is high-quality data through the API interfaces," says Lindberg. In other words, transactions won't be cancelled after the order process – because the account coverage is quickly clarified.

In Europe, the increasingly defined framework of the Payment Service Directives (PSD) has enabled open-banking fintechs to establish connections for so-called payment initiation. The big advantage: This payment method is associated with lower transaction fees compared to credit cards, which, along with classics like PayPal, dominate e-commerce. Many market observers believe that account-to-account payments can significantly challenge credit cards. However, speculation about the death of the credit card are misplaced, states Lindberg. „Credit cards will not disappear. There will be coexistence with A2A and other payment methods, even though merchant preferences are likely to strongly favour Trustly.“

Trustly's key figures for 2023 are as follows: A total payment volume of 58 billion euros was processed, spread across 247 million transactions. The Swedes are present in more than 30 markets and have a portfolio of 12,000 connected banks and 9,000 merchants. „And we've been profitable for ten years. We will also demonstrate this when the 2024 figures are released soon," he says.

Four years ago, Trustly had prepared for an initial public offering (IPO), but the listing was then canceled. The market rumours about an indicative valuation are quite divergent: While recently (likely referring to a secondary market transaction), 1.35 billion dollars was mentioned, majority shareholder Nordic Capital suggested a value of up to 10 billion dollars in the autumn. Nordic Capital had acquired the stake from Bridgepoint in 2018. Blackrock and Neuberger Berman are among the other shareholders.

Jussi Lindberg joined Trustly after stints at PayPal and Adyen because he wanted to experience the „thrill“ of building something with high double-digit growth rates. He typically works from Stockholm but also visits the Berlin office. „We used to have an office in Cologne. But since many employees and clients, like Zalando, are based in Berlin, we decided to settle here," he explains. The focus is not only on merchants but also on companies with international business, or foreign companies operating in Germany that require payment services. Lindberg says the number of transactions in Germany increased by 140% in 2024.

Lindberg sees Trustly as well-prepared for the full implementation of instant payments this fall. The company has developed its own solution for „Verification of Payee“, which allows for the seconds-fast identification of payment recipients. Around half of Trustly's more than 900 employees work as developers to create solutions on the tech level.