How RBI's new P2P lending rules can hamper MobiKwik's IPO dream

New Delhi, Oct 27 (IANS) The initial public offering (IPO) of fintech company MobiKwik may hit a significant roadblock with the new rules for P2P lending implemented recently by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) and these can affect the company's business too.

On August 16, the RBI brought out new rules for peer-to-peer (P2P) lending, effectively disallowing "anytime withdrawals" and investors will get the money along with interest on a fixed date every month only when the borrower pays an instalment to the lender.

Due to this, MobiKwik's lending partner Lendbox has ended the flexi withdrawal facility provided to its users and many users are stuck in P2P lending.

MobiKwik's spokesperson said in a report, that "following the RBI's amendment to the P2P-NBFC master directions on August 16, 2024, Lendbox was required to restructure the P2P lending product, resulting in the stoppage of 'anytime withdrawals' among other changes".

"The updated master instructions by the central bank mandated that loan repayments to lenders can be made only from actual repayments received from mapped borrowers," he added.

The RBI's new rules may also impact the company's IPO because a large chunk of the company's income in FY24 came from interest on servicing loans. The company's operating income in FY24 was Rs 875 crore and during this period, it made a profit of Rs 14 crore. At the same time, the operating income of the company in FY 23 was Rs 539 crore. During this period, it had incurred a loss of Rs 84 crore.

In September, the fintech firm received approval from the Securities Exchange Board of India (SEBI) to launch an IPO of Rs 700 crore. According to the reports, this entire IPO will be a fresh issue. The company plans to invest Rs 250 crore for the expansion of the financial services business, Rs 135 crore for growth in the payment services sector, and Rs 135 crore for investment in data, machine learning, AI, and technology.

--IANS

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