Intuit is buying personal finance startup Credit Karma for $7.1 billion in cash and stock

What just happened? Intuit, the financial software giant responsible for products like TurboTax, QuickBooks and Mint, on Tuesday announced plans to acquire personal finance company Credit Karma for $7.1 billion in cash and stock.

Credit Karma was founded in 2007 as a personal finance management platform where consumers can check their credit scores and reports, prepare their taxes and find unclaimed money such as insurance payouts or refunds. To date, Credit Karma has over 100 million members in the US, Canada and the UK with more than 37 million monthly active users – 88 percent of which engage with the platform via mobile devices.

The acquisition is the largest ever for Intuit, a company founded in 1983.

Intuit CEO Sasan Goodarzi said their mission is to power prosperity around the world with a bold goal of doubling the household savings rate for customers on their platform.

Specifically, Intuit believes it can help people find the right financial products by matching consumers with pre-approved offers for loans and credit cards, turn users on to higher yield savings accounts and provide insight and advice to help consumers make better decisions with their money and improve their credit score.

Per TechCrunch, Intuit plans to run Credit Karma as a standalone venture that’ll continue to be led by co-founder and CEO Kenneth Lin.

The deal is expected to close in the second half of calendar year 2020.

Masthead credit: Fish by maxsattana.