Barclays has sealed a deal to acquire the UK business of GoHenry, a money management app for youth, from Acorns Grow.
Financial terms of the transaction were not disclosed.
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GoHenry offers prepaid debit cards to kids and teens aged between six and 18 years, with integrated parental tools to guide their decisions.
Since its inception in 2012, GoHenry has served over 2 million young people. The company employs around 200 people.
Acorns CEO Noah Kerner said: “Acquiring GoHenry in 2023 accelerated that ambitious vision, establishing Acorns Early as a US leader in the kids space with over 1.4 million customers. As we double down on growing the leading financial wellness app for American families, selling the GoHenry UK business to Barclays allows GoHenry to serve many more UK kids and further its important mission.”
The deal is due to be finalised in the fourth quarter of 2026, contingent on regulatory clearance.
Barclays said the purchase “accelerates” its strategy to “deepen customer relationships, including with mass affluent households, through purpose-built capabilities”.
The GoHenry brand and its standalone app will be retained.
The deal is anticipated to lower Barclays’ CET1 ratio by around 5bps and will not affect its financial guidance or targets for 2026 or 2028.
Acorns will maintain GoHenry’s US business, which operates under the brand Acorns Early, along with Pixpay in Europe.
The bank is considering more opportunities for collaboration with Acorns.
Barclays UK CEO Vim Maru said: “GoHenry supports our vision to offer a deep and seamless banking experience to customers through all of life’s big moments, whether opening a very first account, saving for retirement, and everything in between.”
Meanwhile, in April, Maru told The Times that Barclays will widen its high-street presence by opening new branches, enlarging some existing sites and reintroducing the “bank manager” job title.
The latest deal follows Barclays’ investment in CommonAI, a collaborative engineering platform, last week. CommonAI unifies startups, enterprises, engineers, and academics to collaboratively build, trial, and implement AI solutions at scale.
