Stripe has acquired the team behind Valora, the mobile-first crypto wallet built on the Celo network, in a strategic move to bolster its stablecoin capabilities. Valora founder Jackie Bona confirmed the acquisition on Wednesday, stating the team would join Stripe "to pursue the mission of expanding global access to financial systems." The terms of the deal, including headcount, were not disclosed.
The acquisition is structured as an "acqui-hire," meaning Stripe gains the engineering talent but not Valora's intellectual property. The Valora app itself will return to cLabs, Celo's core development studio, which originally spun out the project in 2021. cLabs will now oversee the wallet's future development, keeping the product aligned with the Celo ecosystem as it transitions from a Layer 1 to an Ethereum Layer 2 blockchain.
This move accelerates Stripe's multi-pronged stablecoin strategy, which has intensified over the past year. In late October 2024, Stripe purchased crypto infrastructure firm Bridge, forming the foundation for its Open Issuance platform for building custom stablecoins. Stripe is also involved in Tempo, a payments-focused Layer 1 blockchain, and earlier this year acquired crypto wallet firm Privy. The Valora team brings expertise in mobile-first wallets and frictionless peer-to-peer payments, which Stripe aims to integrate into its merchant-facing payment flows.
Stripe's co-founders, Patrick and John Collison, highlighted in their annual letter that stablecoins represent an "improvement" on the "basic useability of money." They noted that after discontinuing Bitcoin support in 2018, the company spent years testing crypto payment models and believes stablecoins have finally reached a point where they can support reliable payment flows. This strategy aligns with Stripe's pursuit of a national bank charter in the United States, which would place its stablecoin operations under a regulated banking structure.
Valora, known for aiming to make sending crypto "as easy as a text message," raised $20 million from investors including Andreessen Horowitz (a16z) and Polychain Capital. It also attracted backing from public figures via a16z's Cultural Leadership Fund, such as Carmelo Anthony and Kevin Durant. The app has been active in emerging markets, with partnerships including M-Pesa in Africa and work with Tether to widen stablecoin accessibility.
With cLabs regaining ownership, Valora's development remains tied to the broader Celo roadmap. Bona stated the app "will continue to live on by returning to its original home at cLabs, which will steward its future development." The arrangement allows Stripe to deepen its stablecoin engineering bench for infrastructure development, while the Celo ecosystem retains a key consumer-facing application.
