Spice Money: Industry Monitoring 23 April 2019
- Priyanka Kanodia
- Apr 30, 2019
- 5 min read
Spice Money
Industry News
Financial Services Companies Bridging the Last Mile in Financial Inclusion
Publication- DQ India
Edition- Online
Date- 23 April, 2019
Jan Dhan, Aadhaar and Mobile (JAM trinity) have paved way for great opportunities in the past two years and facilitated the opening of over 300 million bank accounts. However, the lack of Banking infrastructure, bank branches, and ATM restricts access. India being the only large economy with public digital infrastructure in the form of the so-called India Stack, other critical factors driving India’s digital evolution are UPI linked payments, demonetization followed by GST and its shift toward a cashless economy. Moreover, the cost of data has fallen by 95 percent in the last three years, making it the cheapest globally. Cost reductions have also led to a doubling of smartphone penetration in the last three years, to roughly 300 million users. In all, India is poised for a Financial services disruption and following are the financial services companies that are truly on a mission to plug the gaps in access to various financial services for the masses across the length and breadth of India:
Spice Money - Spice Money is a tech-enabled hyper-local payments player offering cash-in and cash-out, Spice mini ATM, bill payments, airtime recharge and mPoS services. With a deep presence in ‘Bharat’, Spice Money has nearly 85% of the cumulative 150,000 Customer Service Points (CSPs) in semi-urban and rural India. They have dense footprints in BIMARU region, comprising the states of Bihar, Jharkhand, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Chhattisgarh & Uttar Pradesh; accounting for 65% of India’s population. Spice Money, through its latest technology and wide network of Spicemoney agent, is bridging the gaps in access to various financial services for the masses across the length and breadth of India.
Please click on the link below:
Blackstone to buy Essel Propack
Publication- The Times of India
Edition- Online
Date- 23 April, 2019
Blackstone is closing its second major buyout deal this year as it will spend up to $460 million to acquire a majority stake in Essel Propack, the speciality packaging business which makes laminated tubes used by companies like Colgate and Patanjali. The deal will see Blackstone acquire 51% from Essel Propack chairman & MD Ashok Goel, younger brother of Essel Group chairman Subhash Chandra, for Rs 2,157 crore ($310 million) and make an open offer for another 26% stake, where it will spend up to Rs 1,142 crore ($152 million). Goel will continue to hold a 6% stake in the company and will remain an adviser, drawing a fee of Rs 16 crore each for the next five years.
Subhash Chandra’s younger brother Ashok Goel distanced himself from the financial troubles of the Essel Group as he announced the sale of Essel Propack to Blackstone on Monday. “I have no debt. I am not leveraged,” said 56-year-old Goel when asked about if the proceeds of the stake sale will be used to deleverage the group. Essel Group, which also owns companies like Zee Entertainment and Dish TV, has Rs 17,174 crore in overall debt and is selling off assets to pay back lenders. “We are one single and a strong family and we care about each other. But there is no financial or commercial relationship with each other and there is no cross-holding,” he added in a call with the media after the deal. He said he plans to use the proceeds to invest in Essel World and towards philanthropy. Goel had earlier sold a majority stake in the Itzcash to US-based Ebix in 2017.
Please click on the link below:
UPI 2.0 may disrupt banks' PoS business
Publication- ET Tech
Edition- Online
Date- 23 April, 2019
Banks face disruptions in their Point of Sale (PoS) device business as the UPI-based peer-to-merchant payment technology and emergence of nimble fintech players threaten to diminish the viability of an industry dominated hitherto by traditional lenders. PoS devices are used by local vendors and retail store operators to process payments through debit and credit cards with swipe and QR code facilities. Currently, there are about 5 million PoS devices operational across the country. About 3.7 million, or more than 70% of these devices have been deployed by banks.
Reserve Bank of India (RBI) data showed that there were 1.3 million operational devices in February 2016, which rose 63% to 2.2 million in February 2017, driven by an uptick in digital transactions after demonetisation. Deployment growth rate has since consistently slowed, to 38% in February 2018, and subsequently 18% in February 2019. "The market is set to go through major disruptions with the adoption of UPI 2.0 and the impending entry of Reliance Jio, which have already started their pilot operations," said Jaideep Iyer, head of finance, strategy and business development at RBL Bank. Most banks partner with fintech companies to onboard merchants and deploy these devices on the ground.
Please click on the link below:
How Not To Be a Victim of UPI Frauds
Publication- Money Life
Edition- Online
Date- 23 April, 2019
Recently, a Moneylife reader complained about how his brother lost about Rs1 lakh through unified payments interface (UPI) when he linked his State Bank of India (SBI) account on GooglePay app. Someone hacked into his GooglePay account and transferred his money in to a Paytm account through UPI. He immediately contacted SBI and Paytm, but is unable to get any response from both of them. He is finally approaching police to file a first information report (FIR). Four banks, Axis Bank, HDFC Bank, ICICI Bank and SBI act as acquiring bank for GooglePay in India.
This, however, is not the lone incident where UPI app was used to siphon off money. Last year, three bank customers from Kerala found their accounts wiped clear through UPI app for account-to-account cash transfer. They lost Rs12 lakh in a blink, says a report from The Hindu.The police said the hackers transferred the money from the compromised accounts to a few accounts they operated under fictitious names in rural Jharkhand.
Please click on the link below:
JP Morgan to Use Blockchain to Process Faster Payments
Publication- Crypto
Edition- Online
Date- 23 April, 2019
While JP Morgan, may not have the kindest words for cryptocurrencies, it certainly hasn’t been far behind when it comes to advancing blockchain development. A few years ago, it created its own distributed ledger technology (DLT) known as Quorum which was backed by Ethereum. The platform was primarily used to process faster payments and smart contract development. In 2017, using Quorum the bank launched a pilot of its Interbank Information Network (IIN). In 2018, almost 75 banks became a part of the network. Recently, news portal Financial Times reported that IIN would help the banks to resolve issues in a timely manner, which would otherwise take weeks.
Please click on the link below:
Comments