Motilal Oswal starts Pine Labs at Buy, sees 30% upside to Rs 250

Motilal Oswal initiated coverage on merchant-payments platform Pine Labs with a Buy rating and Rs 250 target price, citing digital-payments growth, merchant relationships, affordability products and online payments. It projects 24% revenue CAGR for FY26-28E and EBITDA margins nearing 29% by FY28E.

— Source publishedMon, 21 Sept, 2026, 10:57 IST·First seen Mon, 21 Sept, 2026, 11:13 IST·Source NDTV Profit

What happened

Motilal Oswal initiated Pine Labs with a Buy rating and Rs 250 target, citing India digital-payments growth, merchant relationships, affordability solutions and

Key facts

  • Buy rating
  • Target price: Rs 250
  • Implied upside: 30% from Rs 192
  • Valuation: 25x FY28E EV/EBITDA
  • Estimated revenue CAGR: 24% for FY26-28E
  • DITP estimated at 68% of revenue
  • Eligible P2M MDR: 0.4%
  • Adjusted EBITDA margin: 9% in FY24 to 28.7%-29% by FY28E
  • Estimated FY26-28E CAGR: revenue 24%, adjusted EBITDA 46%, PAT 129%

Why this matters

Pine Labs’ merchant relationships and embedded affordability and online-payments portfolio strengthen its strategic value as a partnership, ecosystem-integration or consolidation candidate in merchant payments.

What to watch

  • Quarterly revenue growth relative to the projected 24% FY26-FY28E CAGR.
  • Adjusted EBITDA growth, contribution-margin trends and progress toward approximately 29% EBITDA margin by FY28.
  • Growth in active merchants, transaction/payment volume and online-payment mix.
  • Adoption and loss/credit-quality performance of affordability products.
  • Merchant discount-rate pressure, incentive spending and competitive moves by payment aggregators, banks and fintech rivals.
  • Any changes in payments regulation, interchange economics, data rules or lending/BNPL compliance requirements.
  • Prioritize cross-selling payment acceptance, affordability/EMI and online checkout products to existing enterprise merchants.
  • Demonstrate sustained improvements in merchant retention, payment volumes, take rate and contribution margin in upcoming results.
  • Expand higher-margin software, checkout and merchant-services offerings to reduce reliance on core processing economics.
  • Use favorable coverage momentum to broaden institutional engagement, while setting measurable milestones for FY26-FY28 revenue and margin delivery.