Hi fintech friends, Osborne here!
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).
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🐦🏆 Tweets of the Week
It’s so cute to see Indian FinTech founders build an app…
Ambani - lets build a full-stack 5G mobile phone network from scratch and then look at FinTech as an afterthought…— Manish R. Jain (@mrjain) July 27, 2023
For the last time:
1. These 22M are not the only taxpayers. The poor pay a much higher portion of their incomes as indirect taxes than the rich.
2. A majority of citizens don't pay income tax because their income is too low (<~60K/pm). Not because they cheat. https://t.co/b0YHbB416D— Ritesh Banglani (@banglani) July 26, 2023
People are saying entry of Jio will disrupt MF industry, I think it will disrupt SEBI.— Nitin Mangal (@nrmangal) July 27, 2023
Now I become an UPI user, the destroyer of my savings pic.twitter.com/XZV8UgARLp— Abhishek (@MSDianAbhiii) July 27, 2023
(Note: I don't endorse any views in the tweets highlighted above. The views of the tweet authors could diverge from my personal views.)
🇮🇳 India
📰 Market Updates
Jio Financial Servicesannounced a joint venture with BlackRock to launch Jio BlackRock, an asset management business in India.
Axis Bank, India's fourth largest bank by market cap, reported INR 11,959cr ($1.46bn, +27% YoY) net interest income and INR 5,797cr ($707mm, +41% YoY) net profit in Q1 FY24 (ended 30th Jun, 2023).
Bajaj Financereported INR 12,500cr ($1.52bn, +34.6% YoY) in total consolidated net income in Q1 FY23 (ended Jun, 2023) and INR 3,437cr ($419mm, +32% YoY) in net profit.
ICICI Bankreported INR 10,636cr ($1.3bn, +44% YoY) in net profit in Q1 FY23 (ended Jun, 2023).
Funding in fintech startups declined 67% YoY to $1.4bn in H1 2023 (ended Jun, 2023)
🚀 Product Launches
Razorpaylaunched MoneySaver Export Account, a cross border banking offering for Indian exporters to open accounts in US, UK and Australia.
📝 Regulatory Updates
SEBI (securities regulator): Proposed to limit retail investors' derivatives risk by linking the equity derivatives trades to their wealth. Issued a framework to set up a Corporate Debt Market Development Fund (CDMDF), envisaged as a ‘backstop facility’ for purchasing investment-grade corporate debt securities.
RBI (central bank): Requested all banks to report all frauds, not just ones over INR 1 lac ($1,220).
💰 Financing Announcements
LeRemitt, a cross border payments startup, raised $1.25mm.
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🌏 Asia
📰 Market Updates
The central banks of Hong Kong and Saudi Arabiasigned an MoU to partner on cross border financial infrastructure, market connectivity and others.
AdaKami, an Indonesian P2P lending startup by FinVolution group, partnered withPT Bank Seabank Indonesia for a loan book.
CapBay, a Malaysian P2P lending startup, claimed to cross RM 1bn ($220mm) in total disbursements to 400 SMB's.
Opn, a Malaysian payments company, partnered withAtome to launch BNPL options in Malaysia and Singapore.
Qashier, a Malaysian payments company, launched its POS terminal for offline payments acceptance.
Xendit, an Indonesian payments company, is expanding to Thailand and Vietnam by end of 2023.
Inward remittances to Philippines for the period Jan to May 2023, amounted to $14.5bn, growing 3% YoY.
Touch and Go, a Malaysian payments startup, launched cross border remittances between Malaysia and Indonesia, Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, Vietnam and others.
Commodities Futures Trading Supervisory Agency, Indonesia's securities agency, launched a state backed cryptocurrency exchange, the first in the world.
Bitkub, a Thai crypto currency startup, partnered with Asphere to launch payments in gaming.
Surer, a Singaporean insurance distribution startup, partnered withDirectAsia, a Singaporean car and travel insurance company, to launch a customisable car insurance product.
Digital banks in Singapore raised their account deposit caps to SGD 75K signalling a possible lifting of the SGD 50mm cap on aggregate deposits of these digital banks.
The central banks of UK and Singaporesigned an agreement to co-develop global crypto standards, CBDC and more.
💰 Financing Announcements
🌏 International
Please find our global coverage and consider subscribing.
US and Global, written by Nik Milanovic.
Europe and UK, written by Michael Jenkins.
Latin America, written by Christine Chang.
Africa, written by Emeka Ajene.
China written by Ning Ye.
Policy written by Mohammad Hamdy.
And of course, our podcast series - Beyond Two Percent and Hey Fintech Friends.
If you’ve made it this far - thanks! As always, you can always reach me at [email protected]. I’d genuinely appreciate any and all feedback. If you liked what you read, please consider sharing or subscribing.
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