Remitly hired former bank executive Sebastian Gunningham, to serve as its next CEO, as the remittance service’s co-founder, Matt Oppenheimer, transitions to board chair, the company said Wednesday.
In a video message, Oppenheimer, who has been CEO for nearly 15 years, touted Gunningham’s experience, noting executive roles at Santander, Amazon, Apple and Oracle, and played up his multinational background.
“He knows what it feels like to navigate a new country while keeping connections back home,” Oppenheimer said of Gunningham, who was born in Argentina but claims Scottish heritage and calls himself “American by journey.”
“He understands that we aren’t just moving money, we are moving hope,” Oppenheimer said.
Gunningham takes over as CEO effective Thursday. He most recently worked as chair of Santander Consumer Finance and vice chair of the Spanish bank’s digital platform, Openbank, according to LinkedIn.
The outgoing CEO said the decision to leave the C-suite “did not happen overnight.” “I was not in a rush, but I knew it was my responsibility as a founder to approach this process proactively and with intention,” Oppenheimer said. “I wanted to find a leader who could carry forward what we’ve built and take it even further. That clarity came when I met Sebastian.”
Remitly’s CEO transition announcement came as the company announced fourth-quarter and full-year earnings. In that regard, Remitly’s send volume increased 37% throughout 2025, to $74.9 billion. Revenue jumped 29% year over year to $1.6 billion. And the company ended the year with $67.9 million in net income, compared with a $37 million loss for 2024, according to figures released Wednesday. Further, Remitly’s customer base grew 19%, to 9.3 million users, from a year earlier, the company said.
“Our growth over this last year has reinforced that our model works on a massive scale, and that we are no longer simply enabling cross-border payments. We are becoming the modern financial platform for globally connected people,” Oppenheimer said in Wednesday’s video.
In addition to serving as CEO, Gunningham will join Remitly’s board.
“I’ve long admired Remitly’s mission and the real difference it makes in people’s lives,” Gunningham said in a statement Wednesday. “Working alongside this world-class team, I look forward to building on our momentum, delivering even greater value to our customers, and driving the significant growth opportunities that are before us.”
In a LinkedIn post accompanying Wednesday’s video, Oppenheimer pointed to Remitly’s refreshed strategy, outlined in a recent investor day, that centers on “expanding beyond global money movement to also serve customers in broader, more ambitious ways.”
“This is the right moment to bring in a leader with deep product instincts, global operating experience, a hunger to leverage AI, and a track record of scaling platforms to serve hundreds of millions,” Oppenheimer wrote.
In an interview Wednesday with Bloomberg, Gunningham referenced ramped-up competition with Remitly’s peers, such as Wise, MoneyGram and Western Union.
“It’s going to be a battle for sure, but we have a very good base to go after that battle,” he said.
The transition, Oppenheimer said in his video message, “allows me to keep our ‘founder’s mindset’ front and center, while also enabling me to be more present with my family, to train for a Half Ironman in July and to more deeply engage with additional board work where I can contribute meaningfully to teams navigating their own pivotal moments.”
Oppenheimer also said he wants to devote time “to cross-industry efforts where Remitly’s experience and platform can help address systemic challenges in global financial services.”
