Hi fintech friends, I'm Osborne, investor in early stage startups.

Please enjoy all the news and updates from the past week in today’s edition. If you feel TWIF brings you value, please share it with your friends (and maybe suggest they subscribe too).

🧐🏆 Posts of the Week

(Note: Neither TWIF nor I endorse any views in the tweets highlighted above.)

📈 Chart of the Week

Source: The Arc

🇮🇳 India

📰 Market Updates

1. The Financial Services Secretary of the Ministry of Finance said banks will be asked to underwrite small businesses with the entire data from the entire digital footprint of small businesses.
2. Private banks in India reported an improvement in profit for the quarter ended Jun, 2024 on the back of strong loan growth. This improvement was led by HDFC Bank who grew net profit by 35% QoQ.
3. The total funds under management in India's National Pension Scheme is expected to grow from INR 12.5tn ($150bn) in Jun, 2024 to INR 15tn ($180bn) by Mar, 2025.
4. The RBI Governor cautioned that banks could face structural liquidity issues because of deposit growth lagging credit growth and users' preference for mutual funds over bank deposits.
5. Banks are increasingly borrowing with shorter term maturity than ever before - total outstanding amount of certificates of deposit issued by banks rose to $51.4bn in the fortnight ending 12th July, the highest amount since Jun, 2012.
6. GoDigit grew its Gross Written Premium by 22% to INR 2,660cr ($318mn) and net profit by 73% to $12mn in the quarter ended Jun, 2024.
7. Castler, an escrow management startup, received in-principal approval from the IFSCA Gift City to provide global escrow and cross border money transfer services.
8. In the Budget 2024 announcement, INR 1441cr ($172mn) (42% lower than the amount in FY24) has been earmarked as payment services incentives for the payment industry.

🚀 Product Launches

1. CRED launched Money, a personal finance management product.
2. Truecaller partnered with HDFC Ergo to launch Fraud Insurance to protect against digital communication frauds.

📝 Regulatory Updates

1. RBI (central bank):
   • Released a draft notification on liquidity coverage ratios, carving out a special category for deposits from digital accounts as "hot money" with a higher flight risk.
   • Released updated guidelines for Overseas Investment by Resident Indians.
2. SEBI (securities):
   • Released the findings of a study it conducted on the intraday trading activity by Individuals in equity cash segment.

💰 Financing Announcements

1. StableMoney, a fixed income investment startup, raised $15mn.
2. Neo, a wealth management company, raised $4mn at $162mn valuation.
3. Auxilo, an education finance startup, raised $12mn in debt financing.

ACQUISITIONS:

1. Acko, a general insurance company, acquired OneCare, a chronic care management company.

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🌏 Asia

📰 Market Updates

1. The use of cash for payments in Singapore is expected to decline to 7% by 2027.
2. Alipay+ expanded its global reach to launch payment acceptance with 90mn merchants.
3. AwanTunai, an Indonesian BNPL startup, secured a $1.8mn debt facility from HSBC.
4. Funding Societies, A Southeast Asian small business finance startup, claimed to have disbursed $64mn in Islamic finance to 2,500 SME's in Malaysia.
5. TerraPay partnered with SWIFT to launch money transfers from financial institutions to TerraPay's network of user wallet accounts globally.
6. MAS committed to invest $74mn for quantum computing and AI application research for the finance sector.
7. UNO Digital Bank in Philippines is reportedly targeting to provide digital financial products to small retailers in the country.
8. Airwallex partnered with Float, a Canadian business finance startup, to launch bill payment features for its user base.
9. HSBC Australia will start automatically blocking all payments to crypto exchanges in July, 2024.
10. Invest Hong Kong opened applications for its Global Fast Track 2024 fintech program and is accepting submissions from global fintech startups.
11. OJK, Indonesia's financial regulator, is planning to increase the maximum limit for P2P funding above the current IDR 2bn ($123K) cap.
12. MAS reported that major financial institutions in Singapore experienced minimal or no disruption to customer services and key operations following the global IT system outage.

💰 Financing Announcements

1. Hive, a Philippine health insurance startup, raised $6.5mn.

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