UK-US tie-up offers investment opportunities for India

UK-based global investment platform Winvesta Limited on Wednesday clinched a partnership deal with US-based global digital trading technology DriveWealth to facilitate greater access for investors in India.

Employing DriveWealth technology, Winvesta, with operations in India and the US, said it was now offering US stock market access via a mobile app to investors across India, enabling them to invest in some of the best known global companies.

Winvesta clients will also have access to real-time fractional shares in familiar US brands, an offering that DriveWealth has pioneered.

"It's astonishing that less than 0.1 per cent of Indian wealth is invested beyond its borders," said Swastik Nigam, Founder and CEO of Winvesta.

"The impact COVID-19 has had on Indian portfolios and the quick resurgence of the US markets has demonstrated the trouble of maintaining a home bias. Partnering with DriveWealth is an important first step in making global investment access easier for resident Indians," he said.

Winvesta said it has launched its app via Android, which notably has a 95 per cent market share in India, where nearly 75 per cent of online activity takes place on mobile phones. The firm also plans to roll out its technology, supported by the DriveWealth partnership, in the UK later this year.

"DriveWealth's API-based technology and Winvesta's tech team have successfully delivered and gone live with our offering on US securities in the middle of extremely strenuous circumstances. Winvesta aims to be the quickest and most economical way for Indians to access international investments, powered by a great set of partners like DriveWealth and beautiful product design," added Nigam.

DriveWealth, which launched its patent-pending real-time fractional share trading capabilities in 2016, was founded with the mission to democratise investing in the US stock market.

"We are delighted to provide our technology and infrastructure to Winvesta to enable the firm to bring investors throughout India straightforward access to US stocks in an affordable manner, without the need for minimum balances, high transaction costs or full share quantities," DriveWealth CEO Robert Cortright said.

"Investors across the world have become more aware than ever of the importance of balancing their portfolios among different assets, and we're pleased to play a role in helping to facilitate global diversification for investors outside the US through partnerships like this one with Winvesta," Cortright said.

The firm offers partners such as Winvesta its unique investing technology, along with a customisable suite of application programming interfaces (APIs) that they can leverage to enhance their services.