The amount of the investment has not been disclosed.

Ant Financial, which owns the Chinese Alipay payments platform and is an affiliate of e-commerce giant Alibaba (NYSE: BABA), has acquired a small stake in Swedish fintech Klarna. (CNBC)

Klarna, along with app-based challenger bank Revolut, commands a valuation of $5.5 billion. Except for its recent loss in 2019, the firm has been profitable, which is rare among unicorns. It offers a “buy now, pay later” scheme that offers shoppers interest-free financing over monthly installments.

The fintech startup currently partners with over 200,000 retailers and e-commerce platforms globally including AliExpress, H&M, ASOS, Expedia Group, IKEA, Farfetch, Adidas, Spotify, Samsung, and Nike. Further, its platform now boasts of over 85 million consumers, and the downloads of its app have grown 33 times since May.

Klarna and Ant cement relationship

According to a Reuters report, which a Klarna spokeswoman confirmed to TechCrunch, Ant Financial invested in less than 1% of the startup’s capital.  The stake comprised both old and new shares.

The valuation for the transaction was a shade above the previous round’s $5.5 billion, which raised $460 million in August. That round was led by Dragoneer Investment Group. Founded in 2005, Klarna also counts Snoop Dogg, U.S. venture capital firm Sequoia Capital and Australia’s largest bank, Commonwealth Bank of Australia (ASX: CBA), among its investors.

Klarna and Ant Financial already had going an e-commerce partnership. Klarna is built into AliExpress and offers to finance the latter’s users. Therefore, the stake sale will take this relationship a step further.

“At the heart of this cooperation between Klarna and Alipay is a shared ambition of innovating truly superior shopping experiences and creating destinations of inspiration for consumers across the world,” said CEO Sebastian Siemiątkowski in a statement.

Expansion plans

Last month, Klarna acquired Moneymour, the Italian ‘buy now, pay later’ startup. The acquisition comes as the fintech plans expansion across Europe.

Meanwhile, the fintech had already launched in Australia in January, introducing its app to Australian consumers.

However, it has no plans to enter China, Siemiątkowski told Reuters.

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