By Milana Vinn
July 14 - Payments company Stripe and private equity firm Advent International have made a joint offer to acquire PayPal Holdings Inc for $60.50 per share, in a deal that would value the payments company at more than $53 billion, two people familiar with the matter said.
The offer, submitted earlier this month, is backed by about $50 billion in committed financing from banks, the people said, and represents around a 28% premium to PayPal's closing share price on Tuesday.
The people declined
to be named as the deal discussions are confidential. Advent declined to comment, while PayPal and Stripe did not immediately respond to Reuters requests for comment.
The proposal follows an initial approach made in early April, the sources said. Stripe and Advent have not received a response from PayPal and are seeking to advance discussions in the coming weeks, the sources added.
Under the proposal, Stripe and Advent would jointly own PayPal, with each holding an equal stake, rather than breaking up the company, the people said. There is no certainty the approach will result in a transaction, they added.
Founded in the late 1990s, PayPal was an early player in digital payments, but has faced increasing competition as consumers have embraced alternative payment methods and rivals such as Apple Pay and Google Pay have gained market share.
It has spent the past several years grappling with slowing growth and intensifying competition in digital payments, wiping out much of the value it gained during the pandemic.
The company's market capitalization peaked at about $360 billion in 2021 and fell to as low as roughly $36 billion this year. It has lost more than 40% of its market value over the past 12 months.
After taking over in March, PayPal CEO Enrique Lores started a sweeping turnaround exercise to simplify the payments provider and sharpen its focus on growth.
In April, the company split its operations into three units covering checkout, consumer financial services Venmo, and payments and crypto, while making a series of management changes.
(Reporting by Milana Vinn in New York; Editing by Echo Wang, Sumeet Chatterjee and Lincoln Feast)
