Travelex to be put up for sale after post-pandemic rebirth
Travelex, the world’s largest foreign currency exchange, is expecting to have new owners within the next two years, its chief executive has revealed.
Richard Wazacz said the Peterborough-headquartered company will likely change ownership having been taken over by its debt holders in 2020 when the business collapsed into administration.
Travelex, which has operations across the world and also runs currency exchange services for Asda and Tesco in the UK, was first hit by an accountancy scandal and a cyber attack in the lead up to the Covid-19 pandemic.
It was then forced to make a wave of redundancies in May 2020 as it failed to sell itself before appointing PwC to oversee its period in administration.
The business emerged with new owners while it decided to pull out of the US and France. Wazacz was then hired as its new chief executive in April 2022 to continue Travelex’s turnaround.
“Our shareholders have been incredibly supportive, and they’ve taken us through that recovery,” Wazacz told Morning Wire. “But over the next 12 to 24 months it’s very likely that our shareholders will want to redeploy that money into new businesses.”
“So in the next two or three months we’ll also be looking for, hopefully, new long-term equity investors to take the business onto its next chapter,” he added.
From Brickvest to Octopus
Before joining Travelex, the CEO was previously the chief executive of Brickvest and a director of Octopus Energy.
He has also presviously served as CEO of Octopus and in various roles at Prudential Assurance, Lloyds Banking Group, BAA and Shell.
The son of Polish political refugees, Wazacz also spoke about his childhood growing up in London, his varied business career to date and why Travelex is more than happy to expand into the likes of Saudi Arabia.
He also touched on why the company’s decision not to operate anymore in France and the US, the most recent and future hosts of the Olympics, is actually a positive for the business.
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