Kakao Pay to go public, unveils new platform

A wide suite of financial services will now soon be available at the tip of fingertips.

Kakao Pay announced its transition on Monday to an “all-encompassing mobile financial service platform”, ahead of its plan to go public on November 3.

Alex Ryu, CEO of Kakao Pay, said they seek to maintain symbiotic relationships of mutual growth with other financial institutions.

“Since digital convergence is accelerated in all areas including online payment and financial services, we expect to increase our market share significantly through unrivalled number of users and the wide ecosystem of cooperative companies supported by our superior technology,” Ryu explained at the online press conference held today.

Kakao Pay has grown into a leading mobile financial platform since it started as Korea’s first Digital Payment service.

Kakao Pay retains over 36.5 million users with MAU of 20 million. It has over 127 partnerships with financial institutions, securing its strong presence in the market as a financial platform.

Users of Kakao Pay have also been provided with essential daily life services including bill payment, membership, e-document, and authentication.

It also provides a wide suite of financial and wealth management services with its subsidiaries including loans, investments, and insurance to these acquired users.

Total transaction volume of Kakao Pay has reached KRW85 trillion for twelve months from the second half of 2020. The revenue has surpassed 102% over the past 2 years.

Meanwhile, the company is offering a total of 17 million shares. They are also planning to raise up to 1.530 trillion KRW in the IPO. The offering price has been fixed at 90,000 KRW, the upper limit of the target.

Kakao Pay will make its debut on KOSPI on November 3 after receiving subscriptions from retail investors from October 25 to 26. Among the main underwriters for the deal include Samsung Securities, JP Morgan, and Goldman Sachs, with joint bookrunner Daishin Securities.

Also joining as co-managers are Korea Investment & Securities and Shinhan Investment.