Chime, Nation’s Largest Digital Bank, Finally Files To Go Public

Amid the stock market’s rebound, Chime, the largest digital bank in America, has filed publicly with the Securities and Exchange Commission for an initial public offering, revealing its detailed financials. As we reported earlier this year, Chime’s revenue grew 30% in 2024 to $1.7 billion, and it posted a net loss of $25 million, a big reduction from its 2023 net loss of $203 million. In the first quarter of 2025, revenue grew 32% from the year prior, reaching $519 million, and it turned a profit of $13 million. Chime has previously said that it was profitable in certain quarters prior to 2025, so this wasn’t its first-ever profitable quarter. After filing to go public, companies typically see their stock start trading within a few months.

Founded 13 years ago, Chime grew popular by offering a free checking account and debit card where consumers could get access to their paycheck two days before other banks made it available. It has catered largely to younger Americans earning between $35,000 and $65,000 and has built a sticky business by requiring customers to set up direct deposit to get access to a growing list of features, including $200 worth of free overdraft protection, personal loans and a secured credit card that helps young and moderate-income consumers build their credit scores.

In the IPO filing, Chime disclosed that 67% of its 8.6 million monthly active customers use Chime as their primary bank. (Consumers must use Chime for at least 15 transactions in a month or have a direct deposit into their Chime account of at least $200 per month for Chime to consider them primary-bank customers.) For years, Block’s Cash App has been trying to get more users to sign up for direct deposit. In December 2024, it reported that 2.5 million, or 4%, of its 57 million monthly active users had set up direct deposit.

Chime seems to be trying to move its brand upmarket while also saying its business will show resilience in the event of a recession. Though its average customer makes significantly less than $100,000, its IPO filing talks repeatedly about Americans “who earn up to $100,000” as its target market. It also stresses that its customers use Chime for their everyday needs, saying that 70% of the purchases it processes are for non-discretionary items like “food and groceries, gas, and utilities.”

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The San Francisco-based digital bank makes 76% of its revenue on payments, or interchange fees–the 1% to 2% of a purchase merchants are charged to accept debit and credit cards. That has ticked down slightly from 80% two years ago as Chime has tried to diversify its business.

Another interesting statistic: Chime lost $220 million in 2024 to “transaction and risk losses,” a consolidation of losses from incidents ranging from people overdrawing their accounts and not paying Chime back to fraud losses. Last year, Chime also spent a whopping $518 million on sales and marketing and $310 million on technology and development.

Venture capital firm DST Global was listed as its largest outside shareholder, owning 52 million shares. Ownership stakes for cofounders Chris Britt and Ryan King weren’t disclosed in the filing.

Chime mentioned tariffs as a potential risk factor to its business, writing, “changes in macroeconomic conditions due to actual or proposed tariff changes could increase consumer prices, unemployment rates, and inflation, each of which in turn could affect member activity on our platform.”