Macquarie initiated coverage of PayPay Corp (NASDAQ:PAYP) with an Outperform rating and a $22.90 price target, saying the Japanese mobile payment platform is positioned to expand beyond digital wallets into broader financial services.
The brokerage said PayPay is the largest QR code payment provider in Japan, with about 65% market share and roughly 72 million users, equivalent to about three-quarters of the country’s smartphone users. It estimates that one in five cashless payments in Japan is completed through QR codes.
Macquarie said this position gives PayPay a large base to expand into higher-margin financial services. The company is shifting from a payments-focused wallet toward a broader digital financial platform offering transfers, savings, lending and investments.
While its financial products remain smaller in scale, the brokerage expects growth as users move from payments to other services. PayPay currently has about 16 million card users, 9.7 million bank accounts and 1.54 million securities accounts.
Japan’s cashless adoption also provides room for expansion. The country’s cashless payment penetration stood at about 42.8% in 2024, while the government has set a target of 65% by 2030. QR code payments have been the fastest-growing segment, expanding at a compound annual rate of about 75% between 2019 and 2024.
Macquarie also said the platform could benefit from advances in artificial intelligence, which could improve personalised services and credit underwriting using transaction data.
source https://www.investing.com/news/stock-market-news/macquarie-starts-paypay-at-outperform-on-finance-services-strength-4563430
