PhonePe leads the pack of fintech players in 2023 backed by strong performance, huge investments

American retail Walmart’s fintech arm PhonePe has left behind new and old entrants to emerge as the highest profitmaker in the digital payments space.

The Bengaluru-headquartered company in October reported a consolidated revenue of Rs 2,914 crore in FY23, registering a 77 per cent growth over FY22 revenue of Rs 1,646 crore.

PhonePe was in talks last week to raise $1 billion, with $600 million infused by parent Walmart. Founded in 2012 as part of Walmart-acquired e-commerce company Flipkart, PhonePe is valued at $12.7B as on Apr 12, 2023 as per data aggregator Tracxn.

In comparison, listed company Paytm had a tough year with recent layoffs on the back of AI and the RBI not having given them a greenlight for halted onboardings, moreover imposing 5.39 crore penalty on Paytm Payments Bank.

In the last-declared quarter for September this year, the company had reported a 32 per cent rise on-year in its revenue to Rs 2518.6 crore for Q2FY24.

In November, Warren Buffet-backed Berkshire Hathaway Inc divested its entire 2.46 per cent stake in Paytm's parent company One97 Communications for Rs 1,371 crore through an open market transaction. The company also saw Antfin cut its stake, making Sharma the largest shareholder in the listed firm.

Troubled fintech BharatPe today released its FY23 financial results, not revealing their losses or balance sheet despite a media query.
As per an official statement, the company recorded a 182 per cent jump in revenue from operations in FY23, from Rs 321 Cr in FY22 to Rs 904 Cr in FY23. The company, which turned EBITDA positive in November, also shared that EBITDA losses decreased by approximately Rs 158 crore.

The Reserve Bank of India this month green-flagged onboarding for platforms Razorpay and Cashfree, as well as Mumbai-based fintech EnKash. The 2018 company has facilitated the digitisation of 2.5 lakh businesses.

Joining the club of wins, InCred became the second, and probably the final platform to enter the Unicorn Club in 2023 after quickcommerce platform Zepto after their $60 million raise.

Raising fresh funds worth Rs 499 crore in their Series D, the fintech has an order book of Rs 7500 crore worth of loans in six years and a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of over 50 per cent in the last three years.