Kristo Kaarmann, CEO and co-founder of Wise.
Eoin Noonan | Sportsfile | Getty Images
Shares of British fintech firms wisely fell on Monday, after the company announced that its CFO Matt Briers will leave the company next year, while its CEO Kristo Kaarman will go on paternity leave starting in September.
Smart shares were down about 4% at 9:45 am London time.
Briers will step down as Wise CFO in March 2024, once Kaarman returns from a sabbatical break, the company said in a press release Monday.
During his time as CFO, Briers took Wise from a scrappy money transfer upstart to a publicly-listed financial technology giant. Wise went public in 2021 in what was the first direct listing in London — an alternative to the IPO where companies offer stock directly to the public without using financial intermediaries or creating new shares.
Briers is the second CFO of a major UK fintech company to announce his departure this month – in May. 11, British digital banking startup Revolut said its CFO Mikko Salovaara is leaving after just two months on the job for “personal reasons.”