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Ajinkya Kawale is a correspondent with Business Standard, specialising in the emerging fintech industry in India. He has also covered agrarian distress in Maharashtra and political developments during the Lok Sabha election season. He holds a postgraduate degree in multimedia journalism from Christ University in Bengaluru. He is a keen follower of India's infotainment space on YouTube and other OTT platforms, apart from non-fiction and biographies in their printed versions.
Ajinkya Kawale is a correspondent with Business Standard, specialising in the emerging fintech industry in India. He has also covered agrarian distress in Maharashtra and political developments during the Lok Sabha election season. He holds a postgraduate degree in multimedia journalism from Christ University in Bengaluru. He is a keen follower of India's infotainment space on YouTube and other OTT platforms, apart from non-fiction and biographies in their printed versions.
Circle will connect Cred users with vetted experts across careers, money, wellness and relationships through text, audio or video at a flat fee of Rs 25 per minute
The spacetech firm will use the capital to deepen its product portfolio, invest in R&D, strengthen its team and expand across the Middle East and the Americas
Trained across four billion transactions and 3 trillion data points, Vulcan aims to improve payment success rates, detect fraud and personalise the checkout experience.
Sinha's three-year term to begin on Oct 1, Mittal to leave board on Sept 30
Proceeds from the proposed stake sale will go to Antfin under a 2023 agreement; Paytm said it is not a party to the transaction and Sharma's direct holding is unchanged
More than 85 per cent of India's $11.4 billion deeptech funding since 2015 was raised in the past six years, as the sector moved from early-stage proof points to commercial validation
Moved ahead of players such as Cred, Amazon Pay
Overall annual funding grew fivefold over four years, rising from $43 million across 12 rounds in 2021 to $200 million across 53 rounds in 2025
Cred and PhonePe raised $1 billion each during the five-year period, while Pine Labs, Razorpay and BharatPe were among the other major recipients of equity funding
The fintech expects at least 5 million users to get onboarded on the platform to access products like credit line on UPI or credit cards on UPI over the next five years, said Sumeet Basrani
Comes at a time when maintaining merchant relationships becomes a paramount priority
Paytm shares surged 10% after Bernstein raised its target price to ₹2,200, citing potential UPI merchant discount rates that could lift the fintech's payments margins from FY28
Apple Pay is set to launch in India by October, initially supporting Visa and Mastercard credit cards but not UPI, as Apple negotiates transaction fees with banks
The Ministry of Finance said UPI users will continue to pay no transaction charges, while a possible MDR could apply only to select merchant transactions above a threshold.
Flipkart-backed super.money expects its new commerce platform splitStore to contribute 20% of revenue by December through integrated shopping, lending and payments
The industry body said consumers and small merchants would remain protected from charges, while any merchant service fees would be commercial arrangements with payment providers
Potential UPI MDR could boost revenues for dominant players like PhonePe and Paytm, while giving smaller apps a viable path to profitability and customer acquisition
The Taxation and Other Laws (Amendment) Bill, 2026, could pave the way for an MDR on UPI. Here's how MDR works, the current structure and what may change
Governor Sanjay Malhotra says discussions on a merchant discount rate for UPI are premature, stressing the need for sustained investment to strengthen India's digital payments infrastructure.
Amendment to PSS Act is the first of several steps; rate, threshold and revenue-sharing formula still undecided