Stripe and Advent reportedly bid roughly $53.4 billion for PayPal

Stripe and private equity firm Advent International have reportedly submitted a joint bid to acquire PayPal, in a deal valued at approximately $53.4 billion, Reuters reports. The offer was submitted earlier this month and is backed by roughly $50 billion in committed bank financing. Under the proposal, Stripe and Advent would jointly own PayPal, with each holding an equal stake.

This isn’t the first time Stripe has been linked to a potential acquisition of the payments giant. Earlier reports in February suggested the company had been exploring a possible takeover and was engaged in preliminary discussions, although no formal proposal emerged at the time.

If completed, the acquisition would unite two of the biggest names in digital payments. PayPal serves around 440 million active accounts and handled roughly $1.8 trillion in payment volume during 2025. Stripe, meanwhile, processes $1.9 trillion in payments for businesses over the same period, and its valuation climbed to $159 billion earlier this year.

PayPal has yet to respond publicly to the offer. The potential deal comes at a pivotal time for the company: CEO Enrique Lores took over in March following a profit warning, and PayPal has since laid out plans to cut at least $1.5 billion in costs over the next two to three years as it looks to return to stronger growth. Reports have also suggested the company intends to reduce its workforce by around 20%.

PayPal, Stripe, and Advent International did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Why it matters

A combination of this size would reshape the digital-payments landscape, merging Stripe’s business-facing infrastructure with PayPal’s consumer-facing network at a moment when PayPal is already under pressure to cut costs and reignite growth.