Welcome to October! While many investors will be hoping that the month of Halloween will turn out better for the ASX 200 than what September brought us, it's still worth taking a look back and seeing which ASX shares performed the best. So today, we'll be chacking out how some of the ASX's hottest stocks – buy now, pay later (BNPL) shares – went over the month just gone.
How did Afterpay and Zip shares perform during September?
Well, let's start off with a bang and check out the BNPL pioneer most of us know the best, Afterpay Ltd (ASX: APT). So Afterpay began September at roughly $134.59 a share. Last Thursday, it finished up at $120.55 a share. That's a month-on-month fall of 10.4%.
Keep in mind that since Afterpay announced that it is to be acquired by the US payments giant Square Inc (NYSE: SQ) in an all-scrip deal, the Afterpay share price has been married to that of its suitor.
What about Zip Co Ltd (ASX: Z1P), Afterpay's closest ASX rival by market capitalisation? Zip shares started September at $6.83 each. Last week, they finished up on Thursday at $7.02. That puts Zip in the green for September, with a rise of 2.78%.
What about the other ASX BNPL shares?
Another BNPL share on the ASX boards is Openpay Group Ltd (ASX: OPY) Openpay had a month more similar to Afterpay's than Zip's. It began the month at $1.34 a share and finished up at $1.33. That's a fall of 0.75%.
Another BNPL share that fared a little worse than that was Humm Group Ltd (ASX: HUM). Humm shares were trading at 96 cents apiece at the start of last month. However, this company concluded September at a price of 84 cents a share. That's a drop of 12.5%.
Laybuy Holdings Ltd (ASX: LBY) is one of the ASX's newer payments shares. But alas, shareholders didn't get much of a better story with this company either. Laybuy went from 55 cents a share to 52 cents over September, a drop of 5.45%.
Faring similarly was Spilitit Ltd (ASX: SPT). Splitit fell from its start-of-September price of 45 cents a share to end the month at 42 cents. That's also a fall of 5.45%.
And our final ASX BNPL share to examine today is the US-domiciled Sezzle Inc (ASX: SZL). Unfortunately for Sezzle investors, this company has seemingly performed the worst out of all BNPL shares over September. It started the month at a price of $6.60 a share, but ended up at $5.77 by the end of Thursday's trading day last week. That's a fall of 12.57%.
So it seems Zip was the best performing ASX BNPL share over September, with Sezzle bringing up the rear. With this infamously volatile sector, who knows what October will bring!