PayPay IPO Will Test Investor Hunger for Super Apps

Japan-based PayPay filed for a U.S. initial public offering Thursday (Feb. 12), saying it aims to continue expanding the capabilities of its digital finance platform.

In its filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission, the company did not specify the number of shares to be offered or the IPO price range of the shares.

PayPay’s platform includes payments, banking, investments and “daily life” features such as access to online shopping and food delivery services, according to the filing. Its payments capabilities include offline code-based payment, peer-to-peer money transfer, bill payment and online payment.

For merchants, PayPay offers code-based payment in store, payment terminals, merchant financing and marketing solutions, per the filing.

As of Dec. 31, PayPay had 72 million registered users, which amounts to 75% of the smartphone users in Japan, and 40 million monthly transacting users, which amounts to 55% of the platform’s registered users, the filing said.

PayPay reached gross merchandise value (GMV) of 15.7 trillion yen (about $104.6 billion) in the company’s fiscal year 2024, six years after the service was launched, per the filing.

“We are a technology-driven platformer dedicated to transforming society for the better,” Ichiro Nakayama, president, representative director, CEO and corporate officer of PayPay, said in the filing. “Today, our focus is on payments and financial services, where we are unlocking the convenience of the digital wallet. Tomorrow, we look toward developing a robust mobile payments user base as we pursue our evolution into a digital finance platform.”

PayPay announced in an August press release that it had confidentially submitted a draft registration to the SEC for a proposed public listing in the U.S.

It was reported in October that PayPay’s valuation could exceed $20 billion when it goes public. The report said that the company’s baseline valuation of $13 billion is based on the expansion of PayPay’s Japanese business and that there is a range of opinions among investors on the company’s expansion prospects outside Japan, which could support a greater valuation.

PayPay’s owner, SoftBank, considered a public listing for PayPay in 2021 and again in 2023. SoftBank said in August that PayPay was one of the late-stage portfolio companies in its pipeline for future public listings.