The oxidation of red phosphorus into sodium hypophosphate with an aqueous extract of bleaching powder was carried out at 12-15 C. and an increase in the yield by 15% was noticed. However, when the oxidation was undertaken with sodium chlorite solution, having a small proportion of sodium hypochlorite the yield was found to be higher than that achieved by the previous methods. Infrared spectra and magnetic susceptibility were determined to ellucidate the structure of Na2P2 06-10 H2O.