CRED announces ESOPs buyback upto Rs 100 Cr this year

Fintech unicorn CRED has announced Rs 100 crore worth employees stock ownership plan or ESOPs buyback program in which employees who have vested options as of Oct 31, 2021, will be eligible to participate in the buyback and sell a portion of their vested shares.

According to the company, they are planning yearly liquidity events to boost employee retention & engagement by creating wealth generation.

Earlier this year as a part of its $81 million Series C round, the credit card bill payment app launched its first ESOP buyback program worth $1.2 million (Rs 9 crore) within a span of 2 years of its operations.

Last month, the Kunal Shah-led company had scooped up $251 million in its Series E round at a valuation of $4.01 billion.

While CRED’s current ESOP program is an ongoing process, several growth-stage startups such as Meesho, Browserstack, Udaan, Unacademy, ShareChat, Razorpay, MPL, Licious and Classplus have bought back ESOP held by their employees in the past 10 months.