New Delhi: The National Payments Corporation of India on Thursday said it has widened the shareholder base and has raised nearly Rs 82 crore from 19 entities including Standard Chartered, Amazon Pay and Phonepe. NPCI has raised Rs 81.64 crore from 19 entities as part of the exercise which widens the shareholder base for the entity widely credited for coming up with platforms like Unified Payments Interface and Rupay, the indigenous alternative to Mastercard and Visa.
Widening of NPCI's shareholder base to 67 comes at a time when the RBI has opened the application window for a new umbrella entity (NUE) based on the lines of NPCI, in order to reduce the concentration risk of the payments system which is entirely reliant on the decade-old NPCI. As per reports, various lenders are thinking of joining hands to apply for the same.
The 19 new shareholders in NPCI will be holding stakes ranging from 0.04-0.44 per cent in the company, it said, adding offers were made to 131 RBI-regulated entities, of which 19 responded.
"With this, we have also broad-based our shareholding to include new categories like payment banks, small finance banks and payment system operators in addition to the existing public sector, private sector, foreign, co-operative and regional rural banks," said Rupesh H Acharya, the chief of finance at NPCI.
Other investors who have taken stakes include Dhanalaxmi Bank, Idfc First Bank, Esaf Small Finance Bank, Suryoday Small Finance Bank, Capital Small Finance Bank, Au Small Finance Bank, India Post Payments Bank, Paytm Payments Bank, E-Meditek Global, One Mobikwik Systems, Sodexo Svc, Transaction Analysts, Hitachi Payment Services, Indiaideas.Com, Payu Payments And Pine Labs, an official said.
The National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) is a not-for-profit initiative of the RBI.
(PSU Watch– India's Business News centre that places the spotlight on PSUs, Bureaucracy, Defence and Public Policy is now on Telegram. Join PSU Watch Channel in your Telegram. You may follow us on Twitter here and stay updated)