Equity markets may be volatile, for one company the dream run doesn’t seem to stop. Shares of e-commerce company Meesho, which made a strong debut on December 10, listing at a 46 per cent premium, have continued to soar and touched a new high of Rs 193.50 on the BSE on Tuesday, propelling the company’s co-founder Vidit Aatrey into the billionaires club. The stock eventually closed at Rs 180.60, up 5.8 per cent, while the BSE Sensex declined 534 points or 0.6 per cent at 84,679.86.
At Tuesday’s close, compared with its issue price of Rs 111, the stock has jumped 63 per cent in just five trading sessions. Aatrey holds around 45.65 crore shares of Meesho (around 10.12 per cent stake) and at Tuesday’s high it was valued at close to Rs 8,834 crore. Meesho was founded by Aatrey and Sanjeev Kumar, back in 2015. Kumar holds 29.96 crore shares (6.64 per cent stake), valuing his stake at around Rs 5,800 crore.
Aatrey is the company’s chairman, managing director and CEO, while Kumar is a whole-time director and CTO.
Over the last few years, Meesho has emerged into one of the leading social commerce platforms in India.
“Meesho’s zero commission business model catering to value conscious customers largely from tier 2 and tier 3 towns is a key differential compared with other listed tech-based consumer service companies in India,” according to Kaustubh Pawaskar, research analyst at ICICIDirect.
In the financial year 2025, Meesho reported operating revenue of around Rs 9,390 crore, up 23 per cent from the previous year. While, its loss had widened to around Rs 3,941 crore, from a loss of around Rs 327 crore, it was attributed to one-time tax-related exceptional items.
Meesho reported tax expense of Rs 2,487 crore and Rs 72 crore in FY2025 and the first half of this year respectively on account of business combination and as this event is complete, there would likely be no exceptional tax expense going forward, which should help reduce losses, pointed analysts at SBI Securities.
What is key though for Meesho is its free cash flow generation, among the highest in the listed e-commerce space.
“Leveraging on efficient business model, the company is able to achieve strong double digit revenue growth with increasing customers and generates consistent free cash flow for last two years,” pointed out Pawaskar.
Meesho typically operates on a zero-commission model and primarily generates revenue through its logistics services and advertisements. Its platform has emerged as one of India’s largest marketplaces in terms of placed orders and annual transacting customers.
The SBI Securities analysts also pointed that the company had integrated Gen AI tools into its engineering stack, helping streamline software code generation and the mobile app was also designed with simplicity and for India specific nuances.
“This has enabled the company to scale-up its platform while simultaneously reducing costs, increase efficiencies and enhance value-generated for stakeholders,” they said.
Meesho differs from Amazon and Flipkart given its asset-light value e-commerce model. Both Amazon and Flipkart have similar platforms of their own – Amazon Bazaar and Shopsy. But, experts note neither has matched Meesho’s traction, given different customer base and higher operating costs.
According to Shubham Dalia of InCred Equities, scaling Valmo, its logistics arm, and generating advertising revenue will eventually decide profitability for Meesho. He feels, since value e-commerce unit economics remain complex, Meesho may need more time to optimise Valmo’s supply chain, while continuing to pass on most efficiency gains to sellers, keeping profitability a longer-term outcome.
“That said, Meesho’s differentiated model, supported by its asset-light logistics network and Valmo’s optimisation engine, gives it meaningful headroom to scale. If the platform can strike the right balance between margin expansion and seller-side affordability, driven by scale, stronger ad monetisation, and disciplined cost control, it could mirror the trajectory of global value e-commerce leaders like Pinduoduo and Shopee,” said Dalia.
Choice International Equities, which had recently started covering the stock with a “buy” rating had said that key categories in fashion and home essentials had remained deeply under-penetrated with 75 per cent unbranded supply favouring value-led e-commerce models and Meesho was best placed to monetise this shift.
Meesho remains in the high-growth phase of the platform lifecycle and is expected to deliver 31 per cent compounded annual revenue growth over financial years 2025-2028, supported by deep value-commerce penetration and logistics efficiencies as Valmo scales, according to Choice analyst Kunal Bajaj.
Its earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization (EBITDA) is expected to turn positive by financial year 2027 and despite this outlook, the stock trades at competitive valuations compared to its peers, indicating “substantial upside potential” as fundamentals strengthen, pointed Bajaj.
