China's Alipay to sell its 3.4% stake in Zomato for Rs 3,300 cr, says report

Chinese payments group Alipay plans to sell its 3.4% stake in food delivery giant Zomato Ltd for Rs 3,300 crore ($395 million) through block deals on Indian stock exchanges, said a report on Tuesday.

Alipay, owned by Ant Group, will offload its entire 3.44% stake by selling 29.6 crore shares, according to three sources and a Reuters review of the deal's term sheet.

Bank of America and Morgan Stanley are advisers on the deal, which is likely to be executed later this week, Reuters quoted the three sources, who declined to be named as the plan is private.

Zomato shares have surged more than 90% this year, after falling by more than half in 2022 when tech stocks struggled around the world.

Alipay "wants to cash out ... the (market) timing is good", said the first source, referring to the rapid rise in Zomato's shares in recent months.

The block deals are set to be executed at Rs 111.28 per share, a 2.2% discount to Zomato's close of Rs 113.8 on Tuesday, the term sheet showed.

In October, Japan's SoftBank sold a 1.1% stake in Zomato.

Alipay's exit from Zomato comes as other Chinese investors have been paring their stakes in Indian companies. In August, China's Antfin sold a 10.3% stake in fintech giant Paytm.

Tech stocks such as Zomato have staged a rebound after a drubbing last year amid a market meltdown, when investors also raised questions about sky-high valuations of some Indian startups that had made their stock market debut in recent years.

With inputs from Reuters