NEW DELHI: One 97 Communications, that operates popular fintech brand Paytm, reported a 25 per cent rise in revenue at Rs 9,978 crore in the just concluded financial year 2023-24.

The company attributed the growth to GMV growth, device additions, and growth in the financial services distribution business.

Since its IPO, when the company went public, it for the first full year EBITDA before ESOP profitability of Rs 559 crore, its earnings results released Wednesday showed.

In the January-March quarter, however, Paytm reported a revenue of Rs 2,267 crore, a modest decline of 3 per cent year-on-year.

"In Q4 FY 2024, we had lower marketing spends, as we paused most of the user growth spending in the month of February and March. We expect to reinvest in these areas in the coming financial year," Paytm informed stock exchanges.

"While we experienced a financial impact in Q4 due to the above disruptions, the full financial impact will be seen in Q1 FY 2025."

Paytm says it is confident of seeing meaningful improvement starting from Q2 2024-25, based on restarting certain paused products and achieving steady growth in operating metrics.

In Q1 of the current fiscal, its focus will be on acquiring new merchants, reactivation of inactive merchants, and redeployment of devices from inactive merchants to new merchants.

"While there will be a smaller net addition of device merchants in Q1 FY 2025, we expect net additions to improve from thereon and recover to past trendlines by Q3 FY 2025."

Its revenue from payment services were up 26 per cent to Rs 6,235 crore; net payment margin was up 50 per cent to Rs 2,955 crore; gross merchandise value (GMV) up 39 per cent to Rs 18.3 lakh crore.

Merchant paying subscriptions for devices have reached 1.07 crore as of March 2024, an increase of 39 lakh.

Revenue from financial services and others up 30 per cent to Rs 2,004 crore; value of loans distributed was up 48 per cent to Rs 52,390 crore.

Further, Paytm said that the active rate and per device subscription revenue has been impacted. Merchant subscription revenue in Q4 was Rs 90 per device per month and it expects it to bottom out at Rs 80 in Q1, post which it should increase towards Rs 100 by Q4 of the current fiscal.

"We continue to address our merchants' needs through innovative product launches and are backed by a large distribution and service network. We recently launched two more "Made in India" soundboxes which are customized to the needs of our merchants, with louder speakers and longer battery life."