Hi fintech friends, I'm Osborne, Principal at EMVC.

Apologies for the delay in sending this out.

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).

✨ Thank you for joining us for the Fintech Cruise in Bangkok

Thank you to everyone who joined us for the Fintech Cruise in Bangkok on 24th April, 2024. It was a fun evening to wind down and connect with fintech friends in Bangkok.

Thanks to our friends at Saison Capital and Citi.

We have a lot more events planned across India, Singapore and Indonesia this year. Sign up here to stay updated on all our upcoming events.

🧐🏆 Posts of the Week

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

🇮🇳 India

📰 Market Updates

1. Zerodha, a stock broker, launched free account opening for users under 25 years of age.
2. SBI Life Insurance reported INR 811cr ($97mm), +4% YoY, in net profit in Q4 FY24 (ended Mar, 2024).
3. Axis Bank reported INR 7,130cr ($855mm), +24.5% YoY, in net profit for Q4 FY24 (ended Mar, 2024).
4. HDFC Bank reported INR 16,511cr ($2.0bn), +37% YoY, in net profit for Q4 FY24 (ended Mar, 2024).
5. ICICI Bank inadvertently blocked 17,000 credit cards of its users by linking the cards to users of other apps. The bank is now reissuing cards to the affected users.
6. Bank Deposits grew by 14% YoY in FY24 (per data as of April, 05th 2024) whereas Bank Credit outstanding grew by 20% YoY during the same period.
7. Wibmo, the PayU owned authentication services provider, is building a prepaid issuance stack and a neo banking solution for banks.
8. PhonePe is exiting most commerce categories on Pincode, its ONDC commerce app, except food delivery.

🚀 Product Launches

1. Hitachi Payments India launched Upgradable ATM, an ATM machine that can double up as a "Cash Recycling Machine" to accept user deposits at non-bank locations.
2. CRED launched offline QR acceptance POS for large format stores.
3. BharatPe launched BharatPe One, an offline payment acceptance soundbox.
4. Paytm relaunched its Soundbox to accept credit card on UPI payments.
5. Yubi partnered with MODIFI to launch SMB financing for cross border trade.
6. Razorpay partnered with Airtel Payments Bank to launch UPI Switch.

📝 Regulatory Update

1. RBI (central bank):
   • Approved PayU's license application to operate as a payment aggregator (PA).
   • Announced the guidelines for voluntary transition of Small Finance Banks to Universal Banks.
   • Invited comments on the Draft Circular on “Digital Lending – Transparency in Aggregation of Loan Products from Multiple Lenders”.
   • Took supervisory action against Kotak Mahindra Bank to stop onboarding new customers through its mobile and online banking channels and to stop issuing new credit cards.
   • Released new regulations for Asset Reconstruction Companies (ARC's).
2. IRDAI (insurance): Removed the age limit of 65 years to purchase health insurance policies.

💰 Financing Announcements

1. Cheq, a credit management startup, raised $4.20mm.
2. Stoxkart, a stock trading platform, raised $12mm from its parent SMC Group.
3. Samunnati, an agri-fintech startup, raised $5mm in debt.

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🌏 Asia

📰 Market Updates

1. Japan's QR payment authority is partnering with Chinese, Southeast Asian and Indian QR payment systems to launch an interoperable QR payment system by 2025.
2. The regulators of Thailand and Australia signed an MOU to cooperate on promotion of respective fintech solutions.
3. Superbank, an Indonesian digital bank by Grab and Singtel, launched Celengan, a daily savings account feature.
4. The Deputy Governor of Bank Indonesia (Indonesia's central bank) stated that Alipay+ has not applied for the license to operate as a payment service in Indonesia.
5. Funding Societies, a Southeast Asian P2P SME lender, partnered with SGeBIZ, a Singaporean procurements platform.
6. Woori, South Korea's largest bank and financial services group, launched DINNOLab, a financial innovation and excellence center, in Vietnam.
7. Atome, a BNPL and financial services startup in Southeast Asia, reported $170mm in Q1 2024 revenue.
8. JCB partnered with SoftSpace in Malaysia to launch JCB payment gateway acceptance in Malaysia.
9. The Deputy Governor of Bank Negara Malaysia, Malaysia's central bank, stated that Indonesia and Malaysia should partner to grow Islamic finance in Southeast Asia.
10. Standard Chartered in Southeast Asia launched its Open Banking marketplace, a platform for customers to access API's of the bank.
11. Standard Chartered Singapore partnered with Visa's B2B Connect platform to launch account to account cross border payments.
12. Nium partnered with Artajasa, an Indonesian financial switch operator, to launch account to account payments in Indonesia.

💰 Financing Announcements

1. Tala, a Global small ticket loan startup, raised $47mm in debt.
2. BillEase, a Philippine BNPL startup, raised $5mm in debt.

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If you’ve made it this far - thanks! As always, you can always reach me at osborne@thisweekinfintech.com. I’d genuinely appreciate any and all feedback. If you liked what you read, please consider sharing or subscribing.

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