PayPal shares increase by 11%, now valued at about $50 billion on its return to NASDAQ

Shares of Digital payment processor PayPal increased to as much as 11 percent, now valued at $52 billion in its return to NASDAQ after spinning off from eBay.

In 2014, PayPal processed 4 billion payment transactions, which is valued at $235 billion. The giant digital payment company changed its landscape ever since it was tied up with eBay in 2002.

Now that it is an independent company from eBay, it has partnered up with other start-ups and giant e-commece sites like Stripe, Square, and even Apple inc, which also came up with its own mobile payment service in 2014.

During the first day of trading, PayPal's shares opened at $41.63 percent above the last temporary closing price it had on Friday, before it was introduced to the public.

With that value in shares, the company is valued more than $50 billion, which is above the $35.5 billion current intraday valuation of eBay. These numbers are notable considering the fact that PayPal was acquired by eBay shortly after its first IPO back in 2002 for $1.5 billion.

PayPal now has 169 million consumers in 200 different countries.

PayPal was created in 1998 as Confinity, developing secutiry software for personal digital assistants. It didn't become as successful as the founders hoped it would be. But it opened up to new ideas, like creating an electronic wallet, which led to what PayPal is now.

J.P. Morgan analysts consider PayPal as the gorilla among independent digital payment service providers. PayPal will be competing with other money transfer companies, like Western Union.

CEO Dan Shulman aims to provide affordable financial service widely.

"It is clear that the potential for mobile technology to transform money extends beyond commerce, and majority of the people in the world lack access to basic financial services", Shulman said.