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By Jaspreet Kalra
March 16 (Reuters) - Walmart-backed WMT.O Indian fintech firm PhonePe PHOP.NS has temporarily paused plans for an initial public offering, citing geopolitical tensions and volatility in global capital markets, the company said on Monday.
PhonePe, which runs India's most popular digital payments app, plans to resume its listing process once stability returns to the markets, it said in a statement.
It aims to list at a valuation between $9 billion and $10.5 billion, Reuters reported this month.
Walmart will trim its stake in PhonePe by about 12% in the IPO, while Tiger Global and Microsoft MSFT.O plan to exit, the IPO filing shows.
The three firms will sell about 50.7 million shares in the offering, and PhonePe will not issue any new shares.
"We sincerely hope for a swift return to peace in all the affected regions," said PhonePe's Chief Executive Sameer Nigam. "We remain committed to a public listing in India."
RATTLED SENTIMENT
The Middle East conflict has rattled market sentiment worldwide as investors grapple with the prospect of prolonged hostilities.
It has weighed on market debuts from Hong Kong to London, with Indian assets under pressure as the rupee fell to record lows and the benchmark equity index slid 7% since the war began, deepening their underperformance relative to emerging markets.
Foreign investors have pulled out more than $7 billion in net terms from Indian stocks over 2026, with more than $5.5 of outflows during March alone.
Weak sentiment on Indian stocks has affected the primary market this year as well, with seven of the 11 IPOs launched listing below issue price.
PhonePe's IPO, among India's most eagerly awaited this year, would be the second largest in its financial technology sector, after Paytm's listing of about $20 billion in 2021.
(Reporting by Jaspreet Kalra, Ashwin Manikandan and Surbhi Misra; Editing by Mrigank Dhaniwala, Harikrishnan Nair and Clarence Fernandez)
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