Prosus eyes PayU IPO in 2025 after stellar Swiggy listing
Prosus aims to list fintech firm PayU in 2025 as the Dutch investor looks to shift more focus to India. On Wednesday it described the market as a pillar for its investment business after the stellar listing of food delivery and quick commerce firm Swiggy netted it gains of $2 billion.
PayU, which is wholly owned by Prosus, had initially planned to list by this year at a valuation of between $5 billion and $7 billion. “We’re late into 2024 already, but we hope that it could be a 2025 event,” said Ervin Tu, Prosus’ chief investment officer, in a call with journalists.
The payment and lending firm recently emerged from a 15-month regulatory ban on new merchant acquisitions and received approval to operate as a payment aggregator in April. It competes with Razorpay and Walmart-owned PhonePe in India’s fast-growing digital payments market.
In a recent note to clients, UBS ascribed a valuation of $4.2 billion to PayU, up from $3.7 billion, driven by higher trading multiples among global payment peers. Prosus sold the global business of PayU last year.
Prosus, controlled by Naspers, is an investor in several late-stage Indian startups including social commerce company Meesho and home services provider Urban Company. Its chief executive, Fabricio Bloisi, said more portfolio companies could go public within 18 months.
