A new financing deal involving plenty of star power and venture capital investors has pushed Wealthsimple鈥檚 valuation to $5 billion and has its CEO anxious to build the brand even further.

The Toronto-based financial services business announced Monday that it has raised $750 million from six celebrities and more than 15 venture capital investment firms including Meritech, Greylock, Dragoneer and iNovia.

The star-studded list of investors includes rapper Drake, actors Ryan Reynolds and Michael J. Fox, NBA players Kelly Olynyk and Dwight Powell and NHL all-star Patrick Marleau.

鈥淚t鈥檚 incredibly exciting and feels great, but I am notoriously a bad person at celebrating things, so I鈥檓 already thinking about what鈥檚 next and where we have got to go,鈥� Wealthsimple co-founder and CEO Mike Katchen said hours after announcing the financing.

He plans to use the new cash to expand Wealthsimple鈥檚 market position, build out its offering of products and grow its team.

Wealthsimple, which began as an online investment manager in 2014, has grown to add Wealthsimple Trade, a commission-free stock trading platform, and Wealthsimple Crypto, which allows users to buy, sell and hold cryptocurrency assets.

It also launched Wealthsimple Cash, a peer-to-peer money transfer app, earlier this year and offers automated investing, saving and tax filing products.

鈥淲e are really trying to become the full-service financial partner, the primary financial relationship in our clients lives,鈥� Katchen said.

鈥淲e鈥檝e come a long way and we鈥檙e offering a pretty big breadth of services to get there, but we have still got a long way to go to the services we offer.鈥�

Part of that long way to go, he said, will include broadening Wealthsimple鈥檚 suite of services again and exploring how its current offerings can provide even more value to customers.

Katchen admitted that he has his eye on an initial public offering, too.

He feels it鈥檚 the best way to build a lasting brand, but said 鈥渋t鈥檚 just a question of timing.鈥�

鈥淲e want to focus on executing our plan and many of those short-term questions that get introduced when you鈥檙e going public can be a distraction,鈥� he said.

鈥淲e鈥檙e just not going to deal with that for the time being, but it is for sure in the plan still.鈥�

For now, Katchen has big decisions to make around deploying his new war chest and a pandemic still to navigate.

While many businesses have struggled during the crisis and had to turn to layoffs, closures and even bankruptcies, the pandemic boosted Wealthsimple.

Katchen noticed people increasing the attention they paid to their finances and many were able to save larger-than-expected amounts of cash they wanted to invest or collect compounded interest on.

He said it sparked 鈥渦nprecedented鈥� levels of activity in Wealthsimple鈥檚 trading and cryptocurrency businesses.

鈥淚 never would have guessed that COVID would have this remarkable tailwind for the investment industry,鈥� Katchen said.

To address those demands, the company scaled as much as it could, while also trying to educate consumers about financial tools.

Education has long been a cornerstone for Wealthsimple, which has marketed itself as an easy-to-understand investment company operating a website peppered with explainers for investing newcomers.

Katchen believes that ethos and branding helped Wealthsimple hook celebrity investors.

鈥淲hen we were introduced to them to talk about this investment opportunity, they already had some affinity for the company,鈥� he said.

鈥淚 think they love seeing a Canadian company be successful, all of them are Canadian, and so there was just an easy conversation to bring them on board.鈥�

It wasn鈥檛 Wealthsimple鈥檚 first time raising big bucks. The company snagged $114 million from TCV, Greylock and Meritech at a $1.5 billion post-money valuation last October.

The last time Meritech and Greylock co-led a funding round was the Facebook Series B in 2006, Wealthsimple said.

鈥淲e invest in companies with the potential to revolutionize industries and become enduring market leaders,鈥� said Meritech鈥檚 general partner Max Motschwiller, in a release.

鈥�Wealthsimple has been able to capture a generation of financial consumers in Canada with financial products that are markedly different than anything offered by the incumbents 鈥� simpler, more human, and built with the kind of technology that delivers an experience consumers want.鈥�

Meritech has also invested in Salesforce, Nextdoor, Zulily and Lime, while Greylock has backed Airbnb, LinkedIn, Coinbase and Discord.

Tara Deschamps, The Canadian Press

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