Searching LinkedIn, we find " QIWI Blockchain Technologies" which appears to have five active employees-including Business Development Lead Andrey Ivanov who supposedly has "created a pipeline of 300 million rubles." If you go to qiwi.tech, which purportedly hosts the company's blockchain and crypto segment, you get a "Site Not Found" error. However, the signs of life in QIWI's blockchain endeavors are scant at best. QIWI was moving into the space several years ago, planning to open a cryptocurrency investment bank and, at one point, issue its own cryptocurrency. The Russian governmen t appears to be moving towards the slightly more lenient model (Read: "Not an outright ban") supported by the Ministry of Finance and Putin. This law could be a boon for QIWI which has a strong presence across Russia, where access to more formalized banking institutions is harder to come by and this law would allow easier access to banking services by way of QIWI.Īdditionally, within a week or two, new regulations on cryptocurrency in Russia are expected to roll out. The law currently only allows for "natural persons" to deposit cash into their account at ATMs from payment companies, while corporations or "legal persons" and "legal entities" must use the services of larger banking institutions. This bill would amend the law "On the National Payment System" to allow payment companies, such as QIWI to accept payments at their ATMs (of which QIWI has 96 thousand) from organizations and companies, in addition to individuals. However, a little-noticed law just passed the State Duma on February 16 and was sent to the Federation Council for approval. QIWI has faced regulatory hurdles in recent years, with restrictions placed on its bank in 2020. Regulatory Upside and Cryptocurrency "Potential" It is important to consider though that QIWI can only see the benefits of such a rebound if they remain a widely used payment processor all else is dependent on keeping users in their ecosystem. Considering this, and the Russian economy's overwhelming dependence on oil and gas extraction, QIWI might be a sneaky play on a Russian economic rebound as oil pushes towards $100 per barrel. QIWI's volume, much like that of Western payment processors like Visa and Mastercard, is influenced by the macroeconomy and the amount of money people have in their pockets. So the overall story of user loss isn't so wrong after all… Oil Rebound and a Russian Economic Recovery Play The company also appears to have closed near to 10,000 of its terminals over the first nine months of 2021. Unfortunately, it's unclear from this one quarter to see whether this trend really has reversed or if we're in for further declines down the line.įurthermore, the number of active QIWI Wallets continues to decline, from over 16.6 million in the first quarter to around 15 million in the third.
Whether QIWI can return to growth largely depends on the Russian economy, the company's competitive positioning, and how successfully the company can further infiltrate online payments.īut the story on QIWI's declining userbase seems to have reversed, at least temporarily, as the company gained 600,000 members in the third quarter-still significantly down from Q1. With the recent sale of the company's 40% stake in Tochka and the loss of the company's betting business, further revenue and income declines in 2022 seem likely as the loss of that income will be realized on an annual basis, though hopefully we should see a bottom here.
The company's net income surged, but only due to a one-time sale adjusted net income fell 17.4% year over year from 3.275 billion Rubles to 2.705 billion Rubles. For the third quarter, QIWI's net revenue declined from 6.6 billion Rubles a year ago to 6.4 billion this year.
Declining Revenue and Userbaseįor a while now, the story has been that QIWI is hemorrhaging users and revenue. With the regulatory environment set to shift on payment processors and cryptocurrencies in Russia, now is a good time to see if there might be any value left in this underfollowed company. However, the company also pays a remarkably high 14% dividend. QIWI Plc ( NASDAQ: QIWI) is a Russian payment processor that has been on the downhill for years, losing revenue, user, and seeing its share price crumble.
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