Hope To Deliver At Least One Profitable Quarter This Fiscal, Says Paytm's CEO
Sharma said Paytm will go back to payments and cross-selling financial services as a core business.
Paytm's Founder and Chief Executive Officer Vijay Shekhar Sharma said he hopes for the company to deliver at least one profitable quarter in the ongoing financial year as the financial technology firm is focused on it.
"We're hoping and working on making sure that we deliver at least one profitable quarter in this financial year as soon as we're able to see a lot more clarity coming our way," he said during an earnings call with analysts.
Paytm saw the full impact of Reserve Bank of India's curbs on Paytm Payments Bank during the first quarter and its earnings were in line with it had guided for, he said.
"I believe that this is just the beginning of the end of I would say, the tough times or the numbers that have sort of stayed at flat level from quarter-to-quarter," Sharma said.
Sharma said Paytm will go back to payments and cross-selling financial services as a core business. This would also be aided by marketing services, where it would help merchants expand and sell more.
As an update on Paytm's multi-bank model for the UPI feature, Sharma said the the company was completing the necessary technology and consumer migration. Once it's done, it would go back to the National Payments Corporation of India to place a request for addition of incremental customers.
Sharma also expects approval from NPCI to come in this fiscal.
During the first quarter, Paytm's net loss widened to Rs 840 crore compared with Rs 551 crore a quarter ago. Its Ebitda loss widened to Rs 792 crore sequentially compared to Rs 223.5 crore in previous quarter and revenue fell 34% quarter-on-quarter.
Responding to a query on employee costs, Madhur Deora, group CFO of Paytm, said, "We do expect it to go down over the next few quarters by another 5% to 7%. So on employee cost, have good trend lines."
The company, in the previous quarter, announced plans to save employee cost by around Rs 400-500 crore. In the earnings release, it said it has achieved a 9% sequential reduction in employee costs.
