Bumble shares jump nearly 50% on report of $1bn Ithaca takeover talks

Bumble's stock jumped almost 50% on Monday after the Wall Street Journal reported that the dating app company is in advanced talks to be acquired for around $1 billion (£757 million). The potential buyer is Ithaca Holdings, a technology holding company that could announce a deal to buy the Texas-based firm as early as this week, the Journal said. Bumble and Ithaca have not commented publicly on the talks.

The share surge pushed Bumble's market valuation above $580 million, according to the BBC. That figure remains far below the peak of more than $14 billion the company reached after listing on the Nasdaq in 2021. Bumble has struggled in a crowded dating market where growth has slowed.

The company said in 2025 it would cut almost a third of its workforce, with founder Whitney Wolfe Herd describing an "inflection point" in online dating. Wolfe Herd launched Bumble in 2014 after co-founding Tinder. She built the brand around a feature that allowed only women to initiate conversations with matches, a rule the company recently abandoned.

The change prompted debate among users over whether the app had lost what set it apart from rivals. "Today, our community is asking for more flexibility, less pressure, and more opportunities to create real, meaningful connections and that is what this new experience provides," Wolfe Herd said in August. Dating apps have come under pressure as younger users grow disillusioned with browsing for dates.

Match Group, which owns Tinder, OkCupid and Hinge, has also seen its shares fall sharply from their 2021 peak. A 2025 report by media watchdog Ofcom found adults in the UK were spending less time on dating apps than three years earlier. Some single people are turning instead to board game get-togethers, book clubs and other group activities.

The reported acquisition would take Bumble private at a valuation of roughly $1 billion. That is a significant discount to the company's public market peak but a premium to its recent trading levels, which had fallen to around $389 million before the talks became public. Ithaca Holdings was launched by a Sequoia partner and a former Meta executive, according to Ground News.