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

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🧐🏆 Posts of the Week

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

🇮🇳 India

📰 Market Updates

1. Central Bank of India received RBI to launch an insurance business in partnership with Generali Group.
2. The microfinance segment reported 11.6% of doubtful loans in the quarter ended Sep, 2024.
3. Private banks made a case to RBI requesting for reduced targets for Mudra small business finance loans amid rising stress in portfolios.
4. The Insolvency and Bankruptcy Board of India (IBBI) proposed changes to the liquidation regulations including auction process and voluntary liquidation regulations.
5. Bajaj Finance reported 21% QoQ growth to INR 66,131cr ($7.8bn) in its fixed deposit product for the quarter ended Sep, 2024.
6. Smallcase reported INR 67cr ($8M) in revenue in FY24, growing 2.2x YoY.
7. India's foreign exchange reserves fell by $18bn in the week ending Nov 15-the sharpest fall on record-as global investors continued pulling out funds from Indian stock markets.
8. RBI pulled up banks for freezing accounts that receive direct benefit transfer (DBT) funds from the government due to incomplete KYC. Banks have also been found to be at fault for delaying KYC updates, resulting in accounts getting frozen.
9. The Insurance regulator (IRDAI) cautioned banks against mis-selling of insurance products, stating that a lot of problems have crept into the bancassurance system.
10. Rupyy, the vehicle financing arm of IPO-bound CarDekho, disbursed INR 300cr ($36M) in used commercial vehicle financing within seven months of launch, and targets to close the financial year 2025 at INR900-1200cr ($100-140M) of disbursals.
11. InsuranceDekho, an insurance distribution company, reported a 671% revenue growth to INR 743.6cr ($88M) in FY24.
12. GrowDigi, a blockchain technology startup, was granted two patents from the Indian government for its sector-agnostic blockchain technology layer.
13. Dezerv, a wealth management startup, reported 160% YoY growth in revenue to INR 26.25cr ($3.1M) in revenue for FY24.
14. The Reserve Bank of India (RBI), plans to launch a pilot program in 2025 to offer local cloud data storage services to financial firms at affordable prices, countering the dominance of global cloud providers like Amazon, Microsoft, Google, and IBM.

🚀 Product Launches

1. YES Bank partnered with Vegapay, a card management startup, to launch Credit Line on UPI.
2. Paytm launched UPI payment services in international destinations including the UAE, Singapore, France, Mauritius, Bhutan, and Nepal.
3. super.money, Flipkart's new payments entity, launched 'superFD', a fixed deposit (FD) product with 9.5% interest rates and UPI payments.
4. Rio.Money, a credit on UPI startup, partnered with YES Bank to launch credit on UPI.
5. Bizom, a retail intelligence platform in India, partnered with Accion and Mastercard Center for Inclusive Growth to launch an embedded credit product.
6. Times Group launched Times Black Card, a credit card in partnership with ICICI Bank.

💰 Financing Announcements

1. Zopper, an insurance infrastructure startup, raised $25M.
2. CredFlow, a small business SaaS and finance startup, raised $3.7M.
3. PeLocal, a small business WhatsApp payments startup, raised $2M.

ACQUISITION:

1. MakeMyTrip, an online travel company, acquired Happay's expense management platform from CRED.

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🌏 Asia

📰 Market Updates

1. Toss Securities, a South Korean stock broking startup, launched Toss Securities Research Center to build research and investment capabilities for South Koreans to invest in US markets.
2. BitGo, a US-based crypto exchange, launched its services in Singapore after receiving license from MAS.
3. GXS Bank, a Singaporean digital bank by Grab, will launch business banking services in 2025 in Singapore, Malaysia and Indonesia.
4. Atome, a Southeast Asian BNPL startup, raised a $200M debt facility from HSBC and others, for use in its various lending products across the region.
5. Bolttech raised a $50M debt facility from HSBC for market expansion globally.
6. Southeast Asia's BNPL market is expected to grow to $53Bn by 2027, according to a report by UnaFinancial.
7. Credit card receivables in Hong Kong was down 0.6% QoQ in the quarter ended Sep, 2024 to HKD 150Bn ($19.3bn).
8. Solarvest, a Vietnamese clean energy company, launched Powervest, a solar financing platform in partnership with DEX Connex.
9. DBS Bank in Singapore partnered with UnionPay to launch a multi-currency diamond debit card, supporting payments in 14 currencies.
10. APAC Financial Regulators and cloud providers recently conducted a first-of-its-kind crisis management exercise simulating a large scale public cloud outage.
11. Crypto.com partnered with Triple-A to allow users to make purchases from various online merchants directly with crypto.
12. The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) released new guidelines to streamline the product approval process for life insurers while maintaining robust consumer protection.
13. OKX, a Singaporean crypto exchange, partnered with DBS Bank to launch instant and free deposits and withdrawals in Singapore dollars (SGD).
14. VoloFin, a Singaporean supply chain finance startup, secured a $50M debt line from a major US bank.

💰 Financing Announcements

1. OneTeam, a small business succession planning startup through employee stock options, raised $2.6M.

ACQUISITION:

1. Hanwa Life, a South Korean insurance company, acquired a 75% stake in Velocity Clearing, a US financial firm.

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