CRED announces Rs 100 crore share buyback from employees this year

Fintech unicorn CRED has announced a Rs 100 crore Employee Stock option programme (ESOP) this year in which the employees with vested shares as of October 31, 2021 can participate. This will be the cumulative ESOP buyback programme after the credit cards payment platform announced its Accelerated Wealth Program to create more liquidity for its employees.

According to the company, the current share buyback is an ongoing process. However, as against the earlier ESOP programmes, which CRED undertook along with its fund-raise announcements, the company is now planning to embark on annual liquidity initiatives to seek more employee engagement.

“Our growth over the past 3 years has been possible because of the collective conviction and contribution of the team. Rewarding the commitment of our team members involves providing them ample opportunities to create wealth -- helping them realise financial goals and invest in their future,” the start-up said in its monthly newsletter.

In January this year, the company announced $1.2 million (Rs 9 crore) share buyback during its $81 million Series C funds raise. “The ESOP buyback was completed on Jan 01, 2021. This is the first ESOP liquidity program initiated by CRED, just two years into its operations. Employees who hold vested stocks were eligible to sell up to 50 per cent of their vested ESOP shares in the company,” CRED said in an earlier statement.

ESOP buybacks have turned into a major draw for the start-up workforce to leverage more wealth creation opportunities. Besides CRED, other start-ups including Cars24, Meesho, Zerodha, Unacademy, Swiggy, Razorpay, CarDekho, BharatPe, OYO, Byju’s, and more that had launched ESOP liquidity offers for their employees in the past few months.

Last month, CRED raised $251 million funding in a Series E investment round at a $4.01 billion valuation, nearly double than its previous valuation at $2.2 billion. The Kunal Shah-led credit card bill payment platform’s fresh funds raise, was co-led by existing investors Tiger Global and Falconedge.
 

Also Read: The IN'CRED'IBLE SHAH of Fintechs

Also Read: CRED raises $251 mn in Series E round; valuation doubles to $4.01 bn