Payments fintech Smartpay has confirmed it has received two separate non-binding buyout offers, including a bid from rival Australian paytech Tyro.

Tyro’s indicative proposal would see it acquire a 100% stake in Smartpay, a rival cross-Tasman supplier of EFTPOS terminals. Another offer by an unnamed “international strategic” has also been presented, an announcement to the ASX has confirmed, suggested to be a “global heavy-hitter” in the payments space.

The recent announcement, in direct response to an article published in the Australian Financial Review (AFR) a day earlier outing the buyout proposal, confirmed that both offers are in the preliminary stage and remain “highly conditional” on the completion of due diligence.

Tyro has offered $NZ1 ($AU 0.91) a share for Smartpay – at the time of the offer, a nearly 59 per cent premium on the company’s share price of NZ$0.63 (at the NZX’s last close on 14 March). Since news of the offers broke, Smartpay’s share price on the NZX surged 45 per cent, hitting NZ$0.85 on 17 March.

The dual ASX- and NZX-listed paytech has a client base of more than 35,000 merchants, with more than 48,000 terminals in market. Smartpay’s market cap is valued at over NZ$128 million, around one-third that of its prospective buyer Tyro (valued at AU$385 million, or NZ$420 million), which itself boasts more than 70,000 merchant relationships.

The company reported a pre-tax profit of $8.8 million in FY24, up 16 per cent on the previous year, with revenue of $96.5 million.

Among Smartpay’s current ownership mix include Anacacia Capital, which owns 17 per cent of the company, followed by Milford (14.9 per cent), Wilson Asset Management (12 per cent) and Microequities Asset Management (13.5 per cent).