One97 Communications, which owns Paytm, has achieved operating profitability in the just-ended December quarter, three quarters ahead of its earlier guidance of achieving this target by the September 2023 quarter. The company’s net loss narrowed to ₹ 392 crore in the December 2022 quarter, as against the net loss of ₹778 crore recorded in same period last fiscal. 

The latest December quarter net loss was also an improvement over the net loss of ₹572 crore recorded in the September 2022 quarter. 

For the quarter under review, the company’s EBITDA before ESOP cost —metric denoting operating profitability — came in at ₹31 crore. Paytm had listed in the bourses in November 2021.

Confident of achieving next milestone soon, says CEO

In a letter to shareholders, Paytm Founder & CEO Vijay Shekhar Sharma highlighted that the company has achieved operating profitability without losing sight of growth opportunities and keeping all compliances as well as risk factors under strict watch.  

In April 2022, Paytm had shared its target of achieving operating profitability by September 2023 quarter. 

Having achieved this milestone, the company is now focused on becoming a free cash flow generating company.

“With our focus on growth and keeping a tight vigil on operational risk and compliances, I am very confident that we will soon achieve our next milestone of becoming a free cash flow generating company”,  Sharma said in the letter, which was filed with stock exchanges on Friday along with third quarter results of the financial services company.

Paytm’s consolidated revenue rose 41 per cent to ₹ 2,062 crore in the December quarter, compared to ₹1,456 crore in the year-ago period.

For the quarter under review, the Contribution profit came in at ₹1,048 crore, up 131 per cent over the corresponding period. Contribution profit improved to 51 per cent of revenue in Q3 FY 2023 from 31 per cent in Q3 FY 2022 and 44 per cent in Q2 FY 2023, driven by improvement in payments profitability, and growth of high margin businesses, such as loan distribution.

Contribution profit is a non-GAAP financial measure and is defined as revenue from operations less payment processing charges, promotional cashback & incentives expenses, connectivity & content fees, contest, ticketing & FASTag expenses & logistic, deployment & collection cost of the businesses. Paytm’s gross merchandise value (GMV) grew by 38 per cent to ₹ 3.5 lakh crore.

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