Grab has spent S$3.2B on acquisitions this year. Most of it is going to one place.

It’s spending billions on businesses that could turn financial services into its next growth engine

Grab has spent roughly US$2.5 billion (S$3.2 billion) on acquisitions so far this year. Strip out its expansion into Taiwan, and most of that money is going toward one thing: financial services, particularly lending.

Until recently, Grab was largely building its financial services business from the ground up.

That is changing. This year, it has spent hundreds of millions of dollars buying businesses that already have customers and lending operations, with Atome accounting for the biggest bet so far.

Here’s a look at Grab’s acquisitions, how much it has spent, and what it’s trying to build with those deals.

Grab’s 2026 acquisitions

Grab’s acquisition spree started in Jan, when it invested an undisclosed amount in Chinese robotics startup Infermove.

But the first major deal came a month later, and it was in financial services.

Feb: Stash (US$425 million)

Grab announced in Feb that it would acquire US-based investing app Stash at an enterprise value of US$425 million (S$543 million).

The deal gives Grab access to a digital investing platform with more than US$5 billion in assets under management and over one million paying subscribers. Stash is also expected to generate more than US$60 million in adjusted EBITDA in 2028.

Grab will initially acquire 50.1% of Stash, with the remaining stake to be paid for at fair market value over the following three years.

Mar: foodpanda Taiwan (US$600 million)

The following month, Grab announced a US$600 million (S$767 million) deal to acquire Delivery Hero’s foodpanda delivery business in Taiwan.

This one was different from the Stash deal. Rather than expanding Grab’s financial services business, it was a geographic expansion: Taiwan would become Grab’s ninth market and its first outside Southeast Asia.

The Taiwan business generated about US$1.8 billion in gross merchandise value in 2025 and was profitable on an adjusted EBITDA basis. Grab plans to migrate foodpanda’s users, merchants and delivery partners onto its platform, with the full migration targeted for early 2027.

Sept: Atome Financial (US$1.49 billion)

Then came Grab’s biggest deal of the year so far.

In Sept, Grab agreed to pay US$1.49 billion (S$1.91 billion) for a 60% stake in Atome Financial, the digital lending business of Advance Intelligence Group.

Atome operates across Singapore, Malaysia, the Philippines, Indonesia and Thailand, offering Buy Now, Pay Later loans, consumer cash loans, BNPL cards and other digital lending products. It has 25 million cumulative transacted users and a gross loan portfolio of about US$1 billion.

The remaining 40% will be acquired roughly two years after the first transaction closes. Unlike the initial 60%, that portion does not have a fixed price: its valuation will depend on Atome’s revenue and adjusted EBITDA, subject to a floor of US$2 billion and a cap of US$4.5 billion.

That makes Atome by far the biggest financial services bet in Grab’s 2026 acquisition spree—and the deal that most clearly shows where Grab is putting its money.

The bet on lending

The common thread between Stash and Atome is that Grab is not simply buying another app or adding another product to its super app.

It is buying established financial businesses with existing customers, products and lending infrastructure—giving it a faster route to scale its financial services operations than building everything in-house.

But why now?

The strategy comes as Grab’s financial services business begins to outpace its more established mobility and delivery businesses.

In Q2 2026, financial services revenue grew 59% year-on-year to US$134 million, compared with 21% for deliveries and 12% for mobility. Lending has also accelerated, with total loans disbursed rising 72% to a record US$1.2 billion.

Part of the sharp increase in Grab’s loan book came from Superbank, an Indonesian digital bank that Grab began consolidating in Jun after increasing its stake to more than 50%. Grab had been an investor in Superbank since 2022, and the bank had more than six million customers by April 2026.

Grab’s gross loan portfolio reached US$2.3 billion at the end of Q2, up 197% from US$781 million a year earlier. Superbank contributed US$761 million of loan receivables to the portfolio, although Grab said the loan book would still have doubled year-on-year even without its contribution.

The business is not profitable yet, however.

Financial Services recorded an adjusted EBITDA loss of US$15 million in Q2, although that was an improvement from the US$26 million loss a year earlier. Grab attributed the improvement to higher contributions from its lending businesses and Superbank.

The company is betting that more scale will change that equation.

With Atome included, Grab expects its Financial Services segment to reach US$500 million in adjusted EBITDA and a gross loan portfolio of more than US$6 billion by 2028.

At the same time, Grab’s core business has finally started generating meaningful cash.

Grab reported its first full-year profit in 2025, and by the end of Q2 2026 it had US$7.4 billion in cash and cash equivalents.

That gives Grab room to spend on acquisitions while continuing to return money to shareholders.

Becoming the “everything” app

Grab has spent over a decade trying to become the “everything app” of Southeast Asia—the one platform a person opens for a ride, a meal, a parcel, and, eventually, their money.

Ride-hailing may have been the entry point, but financial services are increasingly becoming a bigger part of that strategy. Grab already has payments, digital banking and lending products. With Stash and Atome, it is adding investing and a much larger consumer lending business to that stack.

But the bigger question is whether Grab can turn that scale into sustainable profits.

The company now has a much larger lending operation, millions of additional financial services customers and a broader range of products. But it also has greater exposure to credit losses as it lends to more consumers across the region.

That makes the next few years particularly important. Grab has the cash to keep making acquisitions, but its US$2.5 billion spending spree will ultimately have to show up in the numbers—especially if financial services is to become the profit engine management expects it to be by 2028.

Featured Image Credit: Digital News Asia

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