Paytm Sees Revival, Touches Fresh 52-Week High

In line with the broader market bull run, shares of fintech major Paytm climbed over 4% during intraday trading today (November 25) to touch a fresh 52-week high. 

The company’s shares went up 4.33% to touch a year long high of INR 939 during early hours of trading today. With this, the company’s market capitalisation also zoomed to $6.71 Bn. 

This adds on to the bull run that Paytm has been on off late after suffering regulatory blow from the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) in January. Last week, the company’s shares zoomed over 17% to end the week at INR 900. On a year to date basis, the startup’s shares have gone up 5.66% to touch this high.

With this, the company has now managed to turn the boat around from the all time low it hit earlier this year. The hit came after the RBI barred its Paytm Payments Bank (PPBL) from accepting deposits, processing UPI payments and other services due to persistent non-compliances and material supervisory concerns. 

Following the regulatory imposition, the stocks plunged from INR 761 on January 31 to INR 438.35 on February 5.  

Earlier today, Paytm launched a new Unified Payments Interface (UPI) offering, UPI Lite, which allows users to set up automatic top-ups for daily payments under INR 500 that do not require a pin.

The feature will allow users to automatically recharge their UPI Lite balance when it falls below a set limit. Last week, the company also rolled out ‘UPI International’ in select overseas markets to allow users to make cross border payments via the Paytm app. 

Amid these new product enhancements, brokerage firm Bernstein recently doubled down on its bullish projection for the fintech company. Earlier last week, the brokerage firm raised its price target for the company’s shares to INR 1,000 from the erstwhile INR 750. It also reaffirmed its “outperform” rating for the company. 

Besides, the company has also seen an uptick in its financial health. For the  second quarter of the ongoing fiscal year (Q2 FY25), the Vijay Shekhar Sharma led company reported a profit after tax of INR 930 Cr as against a loss of INR 292 Cr in the year-ago period on the back of selling its ticketing business Paytm Insider to Zomato for INR 2,048 Cr.

Further, it also managed to narrow its adjusted EBITDA (excluding ESOP cost) loss by 221% to INR 186 Cr in Q2 FY25 from a loss of INR 545 Cr in the corresponding quarter last year.

Shares of the company lost some gains as the day progressed. Its shares dipped 0.85% from previous close to INR 892.35 as of 2:24 PM.