Chinese conglomerate Alibaba sold 3.1 per cent stake in digital financial services firm One97 Communications (Paytm) – nearly half of its direct stake – in a sign of exit from the Indian market, sources said on Wednesday.
However, Alibaba Group firm Ant Financial has not diluted its stake in Paytm and retains 25 per cent stake in the company.
“There was a huge movement in Paytm stock today as a block deal took place where 2,59,930 shares were sold at Rs 535.90 each for Rs 13.93 crore. Behind the deal is Chinese conglomerate Alibaba, which is selling up to 3.1 per cent of its total equity. Around 6 per cent,” a source closely following the development at Paytm told PTI.
The development comes after Alibaba’s stake sale in BigBasket and Zomato.
“It looks like Alibaba is exiting India as it has sold shares in other investments,” the source said.
The company’s stock closed at Rs 542.25 on BSE. Paytm shares gained after its associate Paytm Payments Bank got RBI nod to appoint Surinder Chawla as its Managing Director and CEO. Email queries sent to Alibaba and One97 Communications did not immediately elicit a response.
Paytm says loan disbursements to grow 4x in December 2022
India’s digital payments and financial services company Paytm saw a four-fold increase in loan disbursements in December 2022 and an increase in the average monthly transaction count of users.
One97 Communications Ltd, which operates Paytm, disbursed 3.7 million loans worth Rs 3,665 crore in December, up 330 per cent year-on-year, according to regulatory filings.
As a result, the total disbursement for the three months ending December 2022 was Rs 9,958 crore, a growth of 357 per cent.
The number of loans grew 117 per cent to 3.7 million for December and 137 per cent YoY to 10.5 million cumulative loans for the three months ending December 2022.
Paytm sees 32% increase in monthly transaction users in December 2022
The company’s monthly transacting users (MTU) grew by 32 percent from 64 million in December 2021 to 85 million in December 2022. Gross merchandise value (GMV) through the platform grew by 38 per cent to Rs 3.46 lakh in December. Ten million.
“Over the past few quarters, our focus has remained on payment volumes that generate profitability for us, either through net payment margin or from direct upsell potential,” it said.
The Noida-headquartered firm, which is India’s largest fintech player, will provide loans to its customers and merchant partners in partnership with non-banking finance companies (NBFCs) Clix Capital, Aditya Birla Finance, Piramal Finance, Fullerton India and Hero Fincorp. Does It earns commission based on the loans issued to Paytm postpaid users and merchants.
The company’s offline services have also expanded. Paytm currently has 5.8 million merchants subscribed to its payment instruments and making continuous payments for services. There is a 190 per cent year-on-year growth in the total number of devices deployed by Paytm from 2 million in Q3 FY22 to 5.8 million by December 2022.
“With our subscription as a service model, strong adoption of the tools drives higher payment volumes and subscription revenue, while increasing the funnel for our merchant loan disbursements.”
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