LONDON - Britain's Revolut has been valued at $45 billion through a secondary share sale to new and existing investors, the financial technology firm said on Friday, making it worth more than some of Europe's biggest banks.

The share sale is being led by Coatue and D1 Capital Partners, and existing investor Tiger Global, Revolut said.

The news comes after Revolut said last month that it had finally secured a UK banking licence, after a three-year wait.

Launched in 2015, Revolut is one of a handful of financial services apps, or "fintechs", to have emerged in Britain in the last decade. It offers financial services via an app, rather than having physical branches.

It made a record pretax profit of 438 million pounds ($564.36 million) in 2023, helped by strong user growth and soaring interest-related income.

With a $45 billion price tag, Revolut is worth more than double French bank Societe Generale, which has a market capitalisation of $19 billion according to LSEG data, and Britain's Barclays, currently valued at $43 billion.

($1 = 0.7761 pounds)

(Reporting by Tommy Reggiori Wilkes. Editing by Jane Merriman)