The troubled fintech giant Revolut offers to withdraw its application for a license for banking licenses in the UK

Revolut has offered to withdraw its application for a UK banking licence, the Mail can reveal.

With speculation mounting that the Bank of England was set to reject its two-year bid for approval, the fintech giant is understood to have asked officials whether it should abandon the effort.

But it received assurances that the process was ongoing and the application was still being considered – even after the auditor said parts of the overdue accounts were “materially misstated”.

The revelations follow more than two months of turmoil at Revolut since executives suggested a license would be granted “immediately”, possibly within days.

The company’s impatience appeared to boil over earlier this month when Revolut CEO and co-founder Nik Storonsky bemoaned the “long and tedious process” and warned the UK was an undesirable place to do business.

But the outburst drew criticism from observers, with one analyst warning that throwing a “tantrum” would not help Revolut secure a license.

Last night it emerged that the Bank of England’s regulators planned to reject the application.

According to the Telegraph, the bank’s Prudential Regulation Authority (PRA), responsible for licensing, told the Treasury in March that Revolut’s first application would be rejected within weeks due to concerns over its balance sheet.

It would be a crushing blow to the company, which has been trying since 2021 to get approval from regulators to expand its services in the UK to take deposits and make loans.

License applications must be approved by two regulators – the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) and the PRA.

However, this statutory warning has yet to be handed over to Revolut, and the tech firm is now in urgent talks to save its hopes of a licence.

Once a statutory notice is given, a company has up to one month to challenge it.

In addition, a final notification of the decision is sent.

Revolut was once Britain’s tech darling, hailed as a “shining” success by Chancellor Jeremy Hunt.

It attracted City heavyweights such as fund management veteran Martin Gilbert, who is Revolut’s chairman.

But its fortunes have since turned, and a rejection would add to the long list of casualties suffered by Revolut so far this year, including a number of senior staff leaving the company.

CFO Mikko Salovaara resigned earlier this month for ‘personal reasons’ while UK bank chief James Radford resigned in March and CEO Michal Laube quit in February.

Salovaara’s departure came just two months after the group published its financial statements.

These showed the company made a profit in 2021, but its auditor BDO issued a warning that some of the revenue may have been “materially misstated”.

This included three-quarters of its £636m revenue in 2021, which BDO said it could not independently confirm.

At the time, Salovaara insisted that Revolut was on course to obtain a UK banking license “any day now”.

The Mail understands that Revolut now hopes to produce an unqualified audit statement from BDO in three months’ time.

In a statement, the company said: “We have agreed with the Bank of England that we will not comment on a pending application for a banking licence.”

The Bank of England and the FCA declined to comment.