Bulk Deals: Three FPIs buy Paytm shares as Softbank sells 4.5% stakes in company - Buy, Sell or Hold? Analyst suggests THIS

Paytm, One-97 Communications, Softbank, Morgan Stanley, BoFA Securities: The second largest investor Softbank on Thursday divested a 4.5 per cent stake along with other foreign investors in Paytm's parent One97 Communications through an open market transaction.

Investors have been selling their stakes in Paytm as the mandatory anchor lock-in period for the pre-offer investors that had invested in Paytm ended earlier this week on Tuesday.

According to bulk deal data available with the National Stock Exchange (NSE), SVF India Holdings (Cayman) Ltd sold a total of 2,93,50,000 shares, amounting to a 4.5 per cent stake in the company.

Also Read: Paytm loss widens in July-September quarter

SVF India Holdings (Cayman) Ltd is a subsidiary of Softbank.

The shares were offloaded at an average price of Rs 555.67 per piece, taking the transaction value to Rs 1,630.89 crore.

On Thursday, BofA Securities Europe SA, Morgan Stanley Asia Singapore Pte and Societe Generale - ODI purchased a total of 1.81 crore shares of Paytm.

Softbank is the second largest shareholder with a 17.45 per cent stake in the company. Post the latest transaction, Softbank's shareholding will decrease to 12.95 per cent from 17.45 per cent stake in the company.

Softbank had invested USD 1.6 billion in Paytm in the last quarter of 2017 and offloaded shares worth USD 220 million at the time of its IPO.

The sell-off was quite evident as Paytm shares witnessed a free-fall during Thursday’s session. The stock was one of the top losers in the market today – slipped by around 11 per cent to Rs 536.6 per share on the BSE against nearly 0.4 per cent fall in the Nifty index.

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According to data from both Exchanges, the total trading volume in Paytm’s shares stood at a little over 47 million in the early morning session on Thursday.

As Paytm’s second quarter number suggest consolidated revenue from operations increased by about 76 per cent to Rs 1,914 crore, “Traders can trade in day range margin, especially for intraday only but are not advised to carry as BTST,” Girish Sodani, Head of Equity Market at Swastika Investmart Ltd said in his comment on Paytm.

For Investors, it’s looking bright but needs to check the sustainability of trades so as of now not advised to enter currently at this level but have strong resistance at above 602 on a closing basis, the marker analyst further stated on what should investors do.

Earlier, Paytm's CEO Vijay Shekhar Sharma in a letter to shareholders earlier this week said that the company is on the right path to profitability and free cash flows, after its recent quarterly reports which showed strong operating leverage and reduction in EBITDA losses.

Shares of Paytm saw a tepid debut on exchanges last year in November. It got listed around 9 per cent discount to Rs 1950 per share levels as against issue price of Rs 2150 apiece at the upper end.