Retail investors, it informed the stock exchanges, increased their stake to 7.72% from 3.49% in the same period, while Canada Pension Plan Investment Board (CPPIB) increased its stake to 1.71% from 1.57% previously.
CPPIB along with BlackRock were the anchor investors in Paytm’s initial public offering (IPO). They had bought more shares in November, right after its listing.
Paytm shares were up 1.65% to Rs 641.25 apiece on the BSE at the close of trade on Thursday.
ET reported on April 15 that Indian mutual funds had been lapping up beaten-down shares of new-age businesses and recently listed startups.
SBI Mutual Fund, ICICI Prudential, Nippon India as well as UTI bought shares of One97 in March, as Paytm shares have since their debut been under selling pressure. The stock fell to as low as Rs 520 on March 23, almost 76% below its listing price of Rs 2,150.
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The
BSE recently sought a clarification from Paytm on the steady slide in its stock price.
Earlier this month, in a letter to shareholders, Paytm founder Vijay Shekhar Sharma said that the
company was looking to operationally break even by the end of September next year.
He also clarified that the expected breakeven on an operating basis — or before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortisation — would be excluding the cost of its employee stock ownership plan (Esop).
Sharma also said his stock grants would be vested to him only after Paytm’s shares cross the IPO price on a sustained basis. At present, Sharma individually holds 8.89% stake in Paytm and another 4.78% through Axis Services Trustee Ltd, as per the company’s latest filings.
In March, brokerage firm Macquarie further slashed Paytm’s share price target to Rs 450 per share, citing lower valuations for fintech companies globally.
ET
reported on March 29, citing sources, that Paytm had been actively focusing on investor relations and was in the process of hiring several senior executives for its investor relations division.
While announcing its results for the quarter ended March 31, Paytm said it had scaled total loans disbursed to 6.5 million, aggregating to Rs 3,553 crore (or about $474 million).
In the fiscal third quarter, Paytm had recorded 4.4 million loan disbursals on the platform.
In addition, it processed a merchant payment volume of Rs 2.59 lakh crore (or $34.5 billion) in the fourth quarter, the company said.
