The valuation of privately held fintech company Stripe Inc has nearly halved over the past two years. The company announced a new funding round on Wednesday that values the company at $50 billion. Stripe had a valuation of $95 billion in March 2021, though the company reportedly lowered its internal valuation to $63 billion this January. Stripe said on Wednesday it had signed more than $6.5 billion in a Series I round with new investors such as Andreessen Horowitz and Founders Fund and Singapore-based GIC and Temasek and Goldman Sachs Asset & Wealth Management. According to Crunchbase, Stripe has already received $2.2 billion in funding. “The funds raised will be used to provide liquidity to current and former employees and to address employee withholding tax liabilities related to equity awards, which will result in the retirement of Stripe shares that will issue new shares to Series I investors,” the company said. In its Wednesday release. “Stripe does not need this capital to run its business.” Stripe is one of a number of companies in the fintech sector, and in the tech world more broadly, that have recently admitted to growing their cost base too quickly for the current reality. The company took steps to address that dynamic in November, announcing layoffs affecting 14% of the company’s staff. SEE MORE: Stripe to lay off 14% of staff as CEO says he made ‘two very consequential mistakes’ At the time, Chief Executive Patrick Collison said in a note to employees that he and his management team “were very optimistic about the near-term growth of the Internet economy in 2022 and 2023 and underestimated both the likelihood and impact of a broader slowdown.” They also allowed operating costs to rise rapidly, he admitted. Stripe said in a Wednesday release that 100 businesses now manage more than $1 billion through its platform.
