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NerdWallet

FintechUSA
New to Unitard
πŸ“‰ Public < $1B
PeakΒ $1.8 BillionToday
βˆ’61%
from peak
  1. πŸ¦„
    Became a unicorn
    2021
  2. πŸ“ˆ
    Peak valuation
    $1.8 Billion ’21
  3. πŸ’”
    Became a Unitard
    ~2022
  4. πŸ’Έ
    Last valuation
    ~$699M
Current status
Public (NRDS)
Live Β· NRDSΒ· NasdaqGM
as of 2026-10-23
$10.93β–² 9.03% today
β‰ˆΒ $699 Million market cap Β· βˆ’61.2% from peak

The rise & fall

6 moments Β· 2009–2025

The key moments, with employee sentiment along the way.

2009
Founded in the wreckage of the crisis
Tim Chen turns a credit-card comparison spreadsheet built for family and friends into NerdWallet.
Wikipedia
Nov 2021
The peak: a $1.8B Nasdaq debut$1.8B
IPOs in November 2021 and briefly touches a market value near $1.8B.
SEC filing
2022
Slips out of the club
Rising rates and climbing customer-acquisition costs squeeze growth within a year of listing.
Macrotrends
From the inside Β· Glassdoor reviews, 2022–25
Glassdoor sentiment turned with the stock: employees who once called it a dream job wrote that the culture cooled after the IPO as the share price took center stage, and reviewers described layoff and reorg cycles arriving almost yearly β€” one round landing even as the company aired a Super Bowl ad.
2023–25
AI answers the money questions
Higher rates hit the lending verticals while AI-driven search siphons the traffic the referral model runs on; the market value settles around a third of the peak.
SEC filing
Today
Still in the club β€” and still trading
Live Β· NRDS Β· NasdaqGMas of 2026-10-23
$10.93β–² 9.03% todayβ‰ˆ $699M cap Β· βˆ’61.2% from peak

πŸ’¬ entries paraphrase anonymous, unverified reviews posted publicly on Glassdoor β†—; dated facts carry their source.

How it happened

NerdWallet is a personal-finance platform that helps consumers compare credit cards, loans, insurance and banking products, earning referral fees when they sign up. It went public on the Nasdaq in November 2021 and briefly reached a market value near $1.8B. Higher interest rates, rising customer-acquisition costs and AI-driven search then squeezed growth, and the stock slid to a market cap around $620M.

Source: SEC filings / company financials (personal-finance comparison and advice platform backed by IVP, RRE Ventures and iGlobe Partners; IPO'd on Nasdaq in Nov 2021 and reached a market value near $1.8B; rising customer-acquisition costs, interest-rate pressure on its lending verticals and AI-driven search disruption cut its market capitalization to about $620M)

Founders

  • Tim Chen
    Co-founder & CEO
    Still there β€” CEOLinkedIn β†—
  • Jacob Gibson
    co-founder
    Now Founding Partner at Better Tomorrow VenturesLinkedIn β†—

Current roles as self-reported on LinkedIn, retrieved 2026-08-19. See our methodology.

Disclosed investors (17)

Historical funding participation; lists may be incomplete and do not establish current ownership or investor losses.

* Lead in a funding round Β· Crunchbase β†— Β· 2026-10-13 Β· Methodology Β· Leaderboard

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Same fate Β· public market cap decline
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πŸ¦„