Wise is licensed to hold your money, and as part of keeping it safe, we follow strict rules set out by the regulators in the countries where we operate.

As of 30 September 2024, our customers are trusting us with the equivalent of 14.7 billion GBP in their Wise accounts.

If you keep money with us, our regulatory obligation is to hold all of it in cash, secure liquid assets, or insured by a comparable guarantee.

How is this different from a bank?

We don’t lend out your money. Banks do. This is why governments require them to insure their deposits by participating in country-specific deposit insurance schemes, like the FSCS in the UK.

Because we’re not lending your money, we handle it differently by safeguarding it.

What is safeguarding?

Safeguarding means we look after your money by keeping it separate from our own money, and making it available to you whenever you need it.

How we hold your money can vary by country, for example:

Wise Payments Ltd (UK)
Wise Europe SA (EEA)
Wise US Inc (USA)
Wise Payments Japan KK (Japan)
Wise Brasil Instituição de Pagamento Ltda (Brazil)