Having purchased its payment system from Yandex

Sberbank is entering the electronic payments market that is strategically important for it through the purchase of a controlling stake in the Yandex.Money system. The search engine will earn $60 million from the sale of a non-core asset.

Sberbank is acquiring 75% of the authorized capital of Yandex.Money Payment System LLC for $60 million, while Yandex retains a blocking stake of 25% plus 1 ruble, the companies announced yesterday. Thus, the entire payment system was valued at $80 million, while the capitalization of the entire Yandex yesterday on NASDAQ was $7.08 billion. At the end of nine months of 2012, the revenue of Yandex.Money amounted to 374 million rubles. ($11.6 million), total Yandex - 19.948 billion rubles. ($620.6 million).

During the transaction, Sberbank and Yandex are creating a joint venture, which will be headed by the current head of Yandex.Money, Evgenia Zavalishina. The board of directors will consist of three representatives of Sberbank and two of Yandex. The deal is scheduled to close in the first quarter of next year.

Now, according to its own data, more than 12 million accounts are registered in the Yandex payment system, more than 9 thousand new ones are opened every day and about 120 thousand transactions are carried out. At the end of 2011, 896 million rubles were placed on Yandex.Money user accounts. (excluding commission for transactions that have not yet taken place). As of September 30, 2012, Yandex.Money's assets were estimated at 1.7 billion rubles. ($56 million), liabilities - 1.3 billion rubles. ($42.7 million).

Yandex created its payment system in 2002 on a parity basis with the PayCash company. In 2007, the search engine bought 50% from a partner; the transaction amount was not disclosed at that time. In its reporting, Yandex later only reported that in 2009 it made a deferred payment of 147 million rubles as part of that transaction. (about $5.8 million). In 2007, experts estimated 50% of Yandex.Money at approximately $15-20 million.

But over the past year, Yandex management has repeatedly stated that it does not rule out selling its payment system. In October 2012, the law “On the National Payment System” came into force, which introduced the concept of “electronic funds” and requirements for operators of such funds: in particular, they can only be credit organizations, including non-banks. In the third quarter of this year, Yandex received a similar license, but even then began to classify Yandex.Money in its reporting as an asset put up for sale.

Negotiations between Yandex and Sberbank became known back in October last year. Later, however, information appeared that Sberbank could acquire another payment system - RBK Money. The bank itself only stated that such a payment business is of strategic interest. Ms. Zavalishina clarified yesterday that offers to buy Yandex.Money came “from a number of international banks and payment systems,” and the final choice was made between Sberbank and “one foreign player.”

“The advantages of the deal for the Yandex payment system are that it joins the gigantic infrastructure of Sberbank, gets access to ATMs, offices, the structure of input-output of money (which is very important for the electronic money system), client base, card products, cheap acquiring,” says Viktor Dostov, Chairman of the Board of the Electronic Money Association. In turn, in his opinion, Sberbank receives several million active users to whom it will offer its services. The deal will allow the state bank to connect the extensive database of online stores that Yandex.Money already has, adds Andrey Efimochkin, director of e-commerce at Mail.ru Group.

In 2011, according to Electronic Money, 125 billion rubles passed through electronic payment systems; the forecast for this year is an increase to approximately 200 billion rubles.

Roman Rozhkov

Sberbank got into the electronic wallet