How XP Inc. drove $66M in incremental revenue by overhauling its customer acquisition strategy
Founded in Brazil in 2001 by Guilherme Benchimol and Marcelo Maisonnave, XP Inc. (XP) set out to make financial markets clearer and more accessible to everyday investors. Two decades later, XP has grown into one of Latin America’s leading financial platforms, serving over 4.7 million active clients with investment, banking, credit, and brokerage solutions.
Results at a glance
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$66M in incremental revenue driven by predictive, privacy-first customer acquisition
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$38M in incremental revenue from performance media optimization
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$28M in incremental revenue from AI-powered audience segmentation
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62.5% improvement in lead qualification
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Privacy-compliant, server-side activation across advertising platforms
The challenge
Amidst growing competition and stricter privacy regulations on digital advertising methods, XP faced increasing pressure to stand out in a crowded market. To grow efficiently, XP needed to rethink their customer acquisition and advertising strategy from the ground up.
“We’re no longer just competing with other financial services. We’re competing with every brand on the internet trying to grab attention. That’s why our partnership with Databricks and Hightouch has been so valuable. Together, they’ve helped us build a modern, privacy-first foundation for personalized experiences at scale.”
Lisandro Lopez
Chief Marketing Officer at XP Inc.
Building a secure, scalable foundation for predictive AI
For XP, customer acquisition is more than just account creation. Their true measure of success is when a new user makes their first investment in the platform. XP initially optimized their ad platforms for account sign-ups, which was the easiest event to track in real time. But this created an acquisition challenge: it could take up to 14 days for 80% of new users to invest. This limitation caused them to miss out on acquiring more valuable users who were likely to invest later.
The solution
To close this gap, XP decided to build predictive AI models that could identify individuals more likely to invest. These predictive machine learning models required access to accurate, high-quality customer data while maintaining strict compliance with privacy regulations. XP also had to ensure that they did not expose sensitive customer data or introduce unnecessary complexity and risk.
XP chose Databricks as the foundation for data science and governance, enabling teams to develop advanced machine learning models with built-in data security management. They paired Databricks with Hightouch, which enabled XP to sync data and predictions directly into marketing tools, including advertising platforms, without duplicating sensitive information. With Databricks and Hightouch together, they could calibrate paid media bids based on the predicted investment behavior.
“Security is non-negotiable for us, which made Databricks an obvious choice. Its built-in governance and data management controls gave us confidence from day one. Hightouch was a perfect complement with its zero-copy architecture, allowing us to activate key data like investment predictions. Sensitive data stays inside Databricks, under our control at all times, and that peace of mind has been critical to how we operate.”
Marcelo Duarte
Head of Customer Acquisition and Growth at XP, Inc.
Driving revenue with predictive AI
With their data foundation in place, XP’s data science team used Databricks MLFlow to train a predictive model that estimated each customer’s likely investment behavior based on early signals, such as browsing patterns, sign-up flow responses, and regional trends. Hightouch syncs these predictions into XP’s marketing and customer engagement tools.
XP aggregates data in Databricks, where AI models predict investment likelihoods and amounts. Hightouch syncs this investment information to ad platforms via Conversion APIs.
The results
Ad bidding driven by predictive AI results in a $38M payoff
To send these predicted investments to ad platforms, XP turned to Hightouch. Previously, XP had relied on client-side web pixels to send conversion data back to each platform when customers opened an account. XP replaced client-side tracking with server-side conversion APIs powered by Hightouch, and sends conversion data based on predicted investments rather than account creation. (Server-side tracking enables more comprehensive, privacy-compliant data sharing between systems—learn more in this blog).
Armed with these early signals, XP’s ad platforms could confidently bid more for high-quality leads and avoid overinvesting in low-value traffic. As a result, XP improved lead qualification by 62.5%, dramatically increased advertising efficiency, and drove an additional $38 million in revenue from performance media.
“We invest millions every month in digital advertising, so making sure every dollar is well spent is a top priority. Our improved strategy centered on data and AI has driven real revenue gains.”
Marcelo Duarte
Head of Customer Acquisition and Growth at XP, Inc.
AI-powered audience segmentation adds $28M in investor revenue
XP could also use AI predictions to segment audiences in Hightouch based on likely future behaviors. For example, customers predicted to invest large sums could be routed to expert advisors or receive tailored onboarding content, while others received more education-focused journeys. This approach unlocked $28 million in incremental revenue by improving match quality between customers and advisors and delivering more relevant experiences at scale.
“To deliver on our customer-first strategy, it’s critical that we match each customer with the right financial advice. Without that, the experience feels disjointed, and we risk losing trust. That’s why our partnership with Databricks and Hightouch has been so valuable. Together, they’ve helped us build a modern, privacy-first foundation for personalized experiences at scale.”
Álvaro Müller
Lead Growth Associate at XP, Inc.
What’s next: scaling predictive AI across the business
XP is now expanding the reach of their predictive AI models to support more teams and use cases across the business. With a strong data foundation and centralized infrastructure already in place, XP is moving faster, scaling more efficiently, and building solutions that adapt to changing market demands.
“Systems shape culture. With our data centralized and accessible through Databricks and Hightouch, our team works more collaboratively and efficiently, translating into real results.”
Caio Muraki de Sá
Senior Growth Manager at XP, Inc.
Watch the talk: How XP built a predictive, privacy-first acquisition engine
This presentation from Databricks Summit covers the strategy and outcomes behind XP’s customer acquisition transformation, including how predictive insights were used to drive measurable revenue impact.