MONTREAL — Neo Financial has raised $64 million in a Series B round led by Peter Thiel’s Valar Ventures, giving the Calgary-based fintech deep pockets and a prominent backer to fuel its ambition to take on Canada’s big banks.

The online-only bank, which offers customers high-interest savings accounts and credit cards with generous rewards, says it plans to expand its offerings to include fintech partnerships with retailers, as well as other financial products for consumers. The Logic reported earlier this week that the company has been seeking executives with experience in residential mortgages as it looks to build a new product in that market.

Asked Tuesday about the move into mortgages, Neo co-founder and CEO Andrew Chau said the company didn’t have any specific products to announce.

“At the end of the day, with Neo, we are here to reimagine the banking experience for all Canadians,” Chau said in an interview with The Logic. “Whether it’s helping them spend and save, which is what we’ve been able to build to date, and then extending into whether they’re looking to invest or eventually buy a home—that’s where we want to insert ourselves.

The company’s valuation in this latest round wasn’t disclosed. Chau declined to say whether the company is profitable or how many customers it has. Neo’s last funding round, a Series A in December 2020 which Valar also led, raised $25 million along with $25 million in debt financing.

New investors in the latest round included Greenoaks Capital, which has backed U.S. fintechs Robinhood and Stripe, and Altos Ventures, whose investments include gaming platform Roblox and South Korean challenger bank Toss. Existing investors Breyer Capital, Golden Ventures, Afore Capital, Inovia Capital and Maple VC also participated.

Neo, founded in 2019 by two co-founders of food-delivery service SkipTheDishes, has grown its headcount to roughly 350 from 110 last year, Chau said. The company’s existing offerings include a savings account with 1.3 per cent interest on funds and a credit card that gives cash-back rewards at more than 4,000 retailers. The company also has a partnership with Hudson’s Bay to run its credit-card program for two million customers.

With the new funding, Neo plans to hire more staff at its offices in Calgary and Winnipeg. “More often than not, in Canada, we have these satellite offices of innovation, where American or international companies are coming in, trying to build these massive brands,” Chau said. “For us, that’s really the opportunity that we see here, in terms of building Neo—how do we attract and build a world-class team based in Canada to take on the Big Five banks?”

Canada’s largest banks have taken note of fintechs’ growing threat, making moves in recent months to compete where tech companies have seen the most success. National Bank, for example, recently eliminated its online brokerage’s stock-trading fees, while TD Bank and RBC are moving into buy now, pay later, an area dominated by global players like Klarna and Affirm.

In looking to challenge incumbents, Neo will have the support of one of the world’s most high-profile tech investors through Thiel’s Valar Ventures. Based in New York, the investment firm has backed a number of high-profile fintechs around the world, with most of its portfolio companies typically located outside of the United States. Some of its past investments include major fintechs like Wise and BlockFi, as well as troubled office-space company Breather in Canada.

In a press release provided by Neo, Andrew McCormack, a founding partner of Valar Ventures, said he’s confident that Neo will become a “giant” in Canada’s financial-services sector. 

“The pace at which they have built and continue to expand their technology, platform, and new enterprise partnerships is among the fastest we have seen in our careers,” McCormack said.