SoftBank Sells Additional 2% Stake in Paytm

SoftBank, the Japanese investment giant, has sold an additional 2% stake in Paytm’s parent company One97 Communications over the last month through open market operations, according to media reports. The investor has reduced its stake in the fintech giant from 13.24% at the beginning of FY24 to just a little over 5%, earning about Rs 3,800 crore in the process.

The latest stake sale by SoftBank coincided with a 20% surge in Paytm shares over the past month. The 2% stake sale yielded close to Rs 950 crore. “SVF India Holdings (Cayman) Limited has disposed of an aggregate of 12,706,807 equity shares of One97 Communications Ltd in a series of disposals undertaken between December 19, 2023 and January 20, 2024, with the disposal on January 20, 2024 breaching the 2 percent threshold specified in Regulations 29 (2) of the Sebi Takeover regulations,” Moneycontrol quoted the company as saying on January 24.

SoftBank has been exiting or reducing its stake in several Indian startups via public market deals. Besides selling its stake in Paytm in tranches over the past year, SoftBank’s venture capital fund, SVF Growth (Singapore), has also exited the online food delivery platform Zomato, earning about Rs 1,125 crore. In December last year, reports said that SoftBank sold its stock worth $310 million in a second round sale in mother and child care e-commerce platform FirstCry.

Since its launch in 2018, SoftBank has earned $5.5 billion through exits from its Indian portfolio as of August 2023. The investment firm is expected to make more partial or full exits in the future.

Paytm, on the other hand, has reported a 38% jump in consolidated revenue at Rs 2,850 crore for the third quarter ending December 2023 (Q3FY24), while narrowing down losses to Rs 222 crore. The company has also seen a sequential increase in its stake by domestic retail investors from 8.28% to 12.85%. The share of domestic institutions, potentially acquiring the stake previously held by Japanese investors, has increased from 4.06% to 6.06%.

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