98% surge in IOUpay (ASX:IOU) share price triggers speeding ticket

Shares in the Malaysia-based buy now, pay later (BNPL) provider IOUpay Ltd (ASX: IOU) were placed into a temporary trading halt this morning. This came after the IOUpay share price skyrocketed nearly 98% to an intraday high of 85 cents in early trade.

In less than an hour of trading, IOUpay shares traded over $62 million worth of volume. This level of turnover is more than double the company’s monthly average volume. Consequently, the ASX’s figurative eyebrows were raised.

What’s the go with the IOUpay share price?

IOUpay shares were placed in a trading halt by the ASX due to the company’s abnormal share price rise this morning. The ASX issued a price query, colloquially known as a ‘speeding ticket’, to the company, which it promptly responded to. IOUpay advised it was not aware of any information that could explain today’s spike in its share price. 

The IOUpay share price has been on a tear since the company announced its partnership with EasyStore to provide BNPL services on 9 February. This means that IOUpay’s BNPL payment option will be integrated into EasyStore’s e-commerce platform.

For those who are unsure of what EasyStore is – it is a Shopify-esque offering operating in South-East Asia. The multi-channel online offering enables over 7,000 merchants to sell products through digital means. The business has been operational since 2013, now with established operations in Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia, Philippines, Thailand, Hong Kong, and Taiwan.

In addition, EasyStore merchants racked up A$435 million of total transaction value in 2020.

The BNPL sector continues to attract plenty of excitement on the ASX. IOUpay is now operating among BNPL giants like Afterpay Ltd (ASX: APT) and Zip Co Ltd (ASX: Z1P). In fact, IOUpay made reference to both these companies in its response to the ASX. As cited from the letter of response, IOUpay stated the following: 

This further expansion of the Company into the BNPL sector, further to its existing interests in the mobile and mobile payments sector, is likely to have been recognised by shareholders as being value accretive to IOUpay Limited shareholders by virtue of recent other BNPL market participants’ relative market performance. This has been demonstrated most recently by material price and value increases in companies such as Afterpay…and ZIP Co…

Mindblowing performance

Make sure you have your socks tightly on for this one… The IOUpay share price has returned a mindboggling 8,955% in the last 12 months. The company’s shares have now resumed trading and are currently fetching a price of 75 cents per share. This represents a more than three-fold increase from the 22 cent price tag on Wednesday last week.

IOUpay’s market capitalisation is now standing at around $198 million.