CRED nears Rs 2,500 Cr revenue in FY24; cuts operating losses by 41%

Reward-based payments platform CRED continues its growing financial journey on the results side for the fiscal year ending March 2024. The fintech unicorn reported 66% growth in its scale during the last fiscal year, while also managing to reduce operating losses by 41%, bringing them close to Rs 600 crore.

According to the company's press release, CRED’s total revenue spiked by 66% year-on-year to Rs 2,473 crore in FY24. Notably, the Kunal Shah-led firm's scale surged 5.8X over the past two fiscal years, with revenue rising from Rs 422 crore in FY22.

Members used CRED for a wide range of payments beyond credit card bills, with strong adoption of P2P UPI payments, as per the release. The expanded adoption of CRED Pay across online merchants, boosted transaction volumes by 254% during the year. 

As a result, the total payment value (TPV) surged by 55% to Rs 6.87 lakh crore, while monthly transacting users (MTU) increased by 34%.

In FY24, CRED's customer acquisition costs dropped by 40%, while its marketing expenses declined by 36% during the same period.

The launch of the CRED garage also gained traction for the company with over 4.2 million vehicles parked on in FY24 for challan and pollution certificate checks, FASTag recharges, and insurance renewals.

CRED saw a 58% increase in monetized members, with contribution margins growing over 20X. The company claims to have been consistently contribution margin-positive for nine consecutive quarters. In the last fiscal year, its operating losses shrank by 41%, dropping to Rs 609 crore in FY24 from Rs 1,024 crore in FY23.

CRED reported a net loss of Rs 1,644 crore, reflecting a year-on-year increase of approximately 22%. This loss includes expenses related to the employee stock ownership plan and taxes. It reported a net loss of Rs 1,347 crore in FY23, while its press release referred to Rs 1,024 crore as the operating loss in the same period.

“Meaningful growth comes from a sharp focus on high-quality users and creating exceptional experiences for them. This commitment to putting members first and rewarding trustworthy behaviour has driven growth, engagement, and trust across our ecosystem—benefiting members, merchants, and financial institutions alike.”, Kunal Shah, founder, CRED added in the press release.

CRED has raised a total of $1 billion (Rs 7,775.20 crore) in funding across nine rounds. According to startup data intelligence platform TheKredible, PeakXV is the largest external stakeholder with 10.4% followed by Ribbit Capital, Tiger Global, and others. Founder and CEO Shah commands a direct 22.8% stake, along with his QED Innovation Labs. 

While a 66% topline growth is nothing to sniff at, one suspects CRED expected to, or is expected to, do better.  The RBI move to regulate P2P lending in the last two months will only make this very significant revenue stream tougher to grow for the fintech, even as the lag between revenues and product and feature launches remains an issue of concern. It would be safe to say that CRED’s Shopping or travel segments are not significant contributors yet, although with a sizable captive user base now, the drop in promotion costs can be expected to continue. Customer acquisition costs are also taking a bit of a pause as the firm figures out the next cohort of users without compromising on its original premise of going for the cream of the crop, in terms of credit scores. 

Like many others, the limited or lack of revenue making opportunities on UPI payments remains an achilles heel, despite a very strong performance there. CRED remains one of the few firms which enjoy the credibility to be able to launch services that integrate multiple databases and information sources well, like CRED Garage. However, after loans, the firm badly needs a secondary revenue stream that is as promising to keep its users interested. Who knows, depending on its experience with auto insurance, perhaps a health insurance policy with CRED level features is around the corner? And we aren’t talking CRED coins here.