Why Flipkart Is Turning Out To Be A Good Investment For Walmart?

When Walmart (WMT) acquired Flipkart in August 2018, it may have not have had any idea that the company’s digital payment subsidiary would turn out to be one of India’s hottest startups. As its largest acquisition to date, Walmart is now reaping the rewards of the purchase.

Through the deal of Flipkart, Walmart also purchased PhonePe Pvt. Ltd, which has been authorized by its board to become its own entity, Bloomberg reported. PhonePe is looking to raise $1 billion from outside investors and has a valuation of as much as $10 billion, a source for the news outlet said.

PhonePe was purchased by Flipkart in 2016 and saw significant growth after the Indian government banned large banknotes to reduce corruption and increase digital transactions in the country. PhonePe is even gaining momentum on Warren Buffet-backed Paytm, which is the leader in the industry for digital payment systems, according to Bloomberg.

By June 2019, PhonePe saw 290 million transactions at an aggregate value of $85 billion versus its 71 million transactions at $22 billion the previous year, the company said. PhonePe grew even more as it began offering new services such as mutual funds, movie tickets, and airline bookings through its app.

If PhonePe moves toward its own independent spinoff, Flipkart will reportedly remain a shareholder of the digital payment company that has seen its business quadruple over the past year. Consumers are using the digital payment system to transfer money to different entities after it was started in December 2015 by three friends.

“Globally, hardly any privately held fintech company has reached PhonePe’s scale on both sides of the network so rapidly,” Sameer Nigam, PhonePe’s co-founder and chief executive officer, said in a statement. “That’s why the strong investor interest.”

PhonePe is also looking to expand its 150 million customers and over 5 million merchants by reaching into India’s other regions, which its competition has yet to uncover. For Walmart, the subsidiary presents a new opportunity as it owns 80 percent equity stake in PhonePe. Tiger Global Management and Tencent Holdings Ltd. each have about 5 percent equity.

Shares of Walmart stock were down 0.34 percent as of 1:12 p.m. ET on Wednesday.