Oxford capital eis fund
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moneybox

Hitting 1 million customers

What drove us to invest?

We’re passionate about backing purpose led businesses, Moneybox offers customers an accessible way to manage their money and plan their life goals, focusing on customer acquisition at the beginning of their saving and investing journey.

The founders, Ben Stanway and Charlie Mortimer both had a strong track record – Ben founded Bloom & Wild and Charlie was instrumental to the growth of Wowcher.

We first invested in Moneybox’s seed round in 2015 at a pre-revenue stage before the business had a single customer and have participated in every round since (bringing in a number of top institutional investors), including its £35m Series D round in 2022. It has raised in excess of £100 million to date.

How has the business grown?

From an initial offering enabling people to ‘invest their spare change’ into a Stocks & Shares ISA, Moneybox now helps over 1 million customers build wealth with confidence across all their saving, investing, home-buying, and retirement needs and manages over £4bn in assets.

It is the clear market leader in Lifetime ISAs and the second-largest wealth manager in the UK by number of customers.

It’s focused on building its customer base and introducing new financial planning services in the future.

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Due to the potential for losses, the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) considers this investment to be high risk.

What are the key risks?

  1. You could lose all the money you invest
    1. If the business you invest in fails, you are likely to lose 100% of the money you invested. Most start-up businesses fail.
  2. You are unlikely to be protected if something goes wrong
    1. Protection from the Financial Services Compensation Scheme (FSCS), in relation to claims against failed regulated firms, does not cover poor investment performance. Try the FSCS investment protection checker here.
    2. Protection from the Financial Ombudsman Service (FOS) does not cover poor investment performance. If you have a complaint against an FCA-regulated firm, FOS may be able to consider it. Learn more about FOS protection here.
  3. You won’t get your money back quickly
    1. Even if the business you invest in is successful, it may take several years to get your money back. You are unlikely to be able to sell your investment early.
    2. The most likely way to get your money back is if the business is bought by another business or lists its shares on an exchange such as the London Stock Exchange. These events are not common.
    3. If you are investing in a start-up business, you should not expect to get your money back through dividends. Start-up businesses rarely pay these.
  4. Don’t put all your eggs in one basket
    1. Putting all your money into a single business or type of investment for example, is risky. Spreading your money across different investments makes you less dependent on any one to do well.
    2. A good rule of thumb is not to invest more than 10% of your money in high-risk investments. https://www.fca.org.uk/investsmart/5-questions-ask-you-invest
  5. The value of your investment can be reduced
    1. The percentage of the business that you own will decrease if the business issues more shares. This could mean that the value of your investment reduces, depending on how much the business grows. Most start-up businesses issue multiple rounds of shares.
    2. These new shares could have additional rights that your shares don’t have, such as the right to receive a fixed dividend, which could further reduce your chances of getting a return on your investment.

 

If you are interested in learning more about how to protect yourself, visit the FCA’s website here.