Saturday, April 27

Morgan Stanley Again Marked Down Valuation of Flipkart

A mutual fund group governed by Morgan Stanley has further reduced the valuation of India’s biggest e-commerce portal, Flipkart. Flipkart shares markdown by 15.5%. This is the second consecutive markdown by Morgan Stanley, after it had marked it down by 27% in the previous quarter.

Morgan Stanley has marked the value of their Flipkart shares at $87.9 per share as of March 2016, down from $103.97 per share as of December 2015 and down 38.2% from $142.24 per share as of June 2015. The markdown pegs Flipkart’s valuation at $9.39 billion, as compared to the $15.2 billion when it last raised capital in July 2015.

Morgan Stanley had picked up shares in Flipkart as a part of its series D round of funding in 2013, when the Bengaluru-based e-tailer had raised $360 million in two tranches. It had also picked up additional shares when Flipkart raised a massive $1 billion investment in August 2014.

Two of Flipkart’s mutual fund investors Fidelity and Valic had further marked down the value of their holdings in the company by 20% earlier this month while a T Rowe Price-managed mutual fund had marked down their holdings by 15% last month.

Flipkart’s other key shareholders include New York-based investment firm Tiger Global, South African media giant Naspers, Singapore sovereign wealth GIC, Russian billionaire Yuri Milner’s DST Global and early stage investment firm Accel.