Walmart to cut 10 percent stake in PhonePe IPO

MUMBAI: Tiger Global and Microsoft will fully exit PhonePe as the Walmart-owned fintech gears up for a debut on Dalal Street in the coming months.

The first Indian business from Walmart's stable to go public, PhonePe is seeking to raise about Rs 12,000 crore ($1.3 billion) through an offer for sale (OFS). Walmart, which holds about 72% stake in the company, is paring its shareholding by 10% in the IPO. Tiger Global, Microsoft and Walmart will together sell some 5 crore shares, updated draft IPO papers filed by PhonePe on Thursday showed. The company had filed for IPO confidentially in Sept last year.

An OFS allows existing company shareholders to offload their stakes and exit their investments; no money goes into the firm's coffers. "Tiger Global and Microsoft held very small stakes in the company. As far as Tiger Global is concerned, they had invested in PhonePe through an old fund and they had to exit the investment. For Tiger Global, there was no choice but to sell," said a person aware of the discussions. Tiger Global currently holds a 0.2% stake in PhonePe while Microsoft holds 0.7%.

Co-founders Sameer Nigam and Rahul Chari sold stake worth Rs 3,937 crore ($430 million) to General Atlantic in September 2025.

PhonePe's IPO is set to be the second biggest public issue floated by a startup after Paytm that debuted on the exchanges in 2021. Growth of India's fintech startups got a fillip following the govt's demonetisation move in 2016 which nudged people to take to digital payments apps.

Founded in 2015, PhonePe which competes with a host of players including Paytm, Google Pay and Amazon Pay was acquired by Flipkart in 2016, eventually joining Walmart's fold after the US retailer bought a controlling stake in Flipkart in 2018. PhonePe, last valued at $12 billion, shifted base to India from Singapore in 2022 and completed separation from Flipkart.