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

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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📝 Posts of the week

📈 Chart of the week

🇮🇳 India

📰 Market Updates

1. Aye Finance filed Initial Public Offering (IPO) for ₹1,010cr ($115M).
2. Sahamati reported account aggregators facilitated ₹24,000cr ($2.6bn) in loan disbursements in first half of FY2026, representing 71% growth from previous period.
3. Dvara E-Dairy disbursed ₹100cr($11M) in loans to 11,000 women dairy farmers across 700 villages through fintech-enabled cattle-based lending platform.
4. Indian government raised Securities Transaction Tax (STT) on futures and options, causing market indices to drop and impacting stock brokerages.
5. PB Fintech grew revenue to ₹1,711cr ($189M) and increased profits 2.6X in Q3 FY26.
6. MobiKwik reported ₹289cr ($32M) revenue and ₹4cr ($443K) profit in Q3 FY26, marking first quarterly profitability after controlling expenses.
7. Bharti AXA Life Insurance partnered with Equitas Small Finance Bank to expand life insurance distribution in semi-urban and rural markets through bancassurance agreement.
8. National Payments Corporation of India reported record UPI transactions of ₹28 lakh crore ($309bn) in January 2026, representing 21% MoM growth.
9. Dhan, a stockbroking startup, reported ₹877cr ($97M) revenue and ₹408cr ($45M) profit in FY25, representing 2.3X YoY growth in revenue and 2.6X YoY growth in profit.
10. PB Fintech planned to revive a $1 billion fundraise through qualified institutional placement after consulting shareholders and assessing market conditions.
11. JioBlackRock Investment Advisers launched a digital advisory platform for INR 350/year ($4/year) offering personalised investment guidance for retail investors.
12. India's fintech ecosystem raised $2.4bn in 2025, maintaining global third-place ranking with significant early-stage funding and key large rounds.

🚀 Product Launches

1. Smallcase launched international stock investing platform on Tickertape with 7000+ US stocks and global ETFs.

📝 Regulatory Updates

1. Reserve Bank of India proposed exempting non-banking finance companies under ₹1,000cr ($110M) from registration to reduce compliance burden.
2. Reserve Bank of India proposed comprehensive regulatory updates covering digital payments, lending norms, financial inclusion, and investment frameworks in fiscal year 2025-26.
3. DICGC launched risk-based premium framework for bank deposit insurance, replacing flat-rate system in FY25-26.
4. Reserve Bank of India increased collateral-free loan limit for micro and small enterprises from ₹10 lakh ($11K) to ₹20 lakh ($22K), effective April 2026.
5. Reserve Bank of India announced consumer protection measures to compensate customers up to ₹25,000 for small digital transaction frauds, with shared liability among customers, banks, and RBI.

💰 Financing Announcements

1. Aditya Birla Housing Finance raised ₹2,750cr ($304M) capital from Advent International.
2. Alt DRX, a fintech startup focused on real estate tokenisation in India, raised ₹6cr($660K).
3. OneStack, an embedded banking SaaS startup, raised an undisclosed amount.

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🌏 Asia

📰 Market Updates

1. Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas, the Philippine central bank, confirmed interoperable auto-debit facility launch, enabling cross-bank bill payments and initiating Malaysia payment linkage in 2026.
2. Durianpay, an Indonesian B2B payments infrastructure startup, processed $5.5bn in total payment volume in 2025, and reported achieving profitability.
3. GCash, a Philippines-based payments startup, secured a $30M facility from Asian Development Bank.
4. Nexus Global Payments added Indonesia to its cross-border instant payments network.
5. Vietnam's alternative lending market projected to grow at 14% CAGR, expanding from $8.7bn in 2024 to $16.6bn in 2029.
6. Singapore dominated Southeast Asian payments sector with $319M funding, 44% of total FinTech investments, and projected digital payments growth to $114bn by 2030.
7. Grab Finance expanded credit eligibility by 50% across six Southeast Asian countries using FICO Platform's behavioural data analysis technology.
8. PolicyStreet, Malaysia-based insurtech startup, aimed to double revenue and expand regional partnerships in 2026.
9. Indonesia and South Korea targeted QR code payment system launch in April 2026 for cross-border transactions.
10. China banned onshore Real World Asset (RWA) tokenisation through new cryptocurrency regulations.
11. TradeTogether, a Singaporean crypto trading platform, received full Capital Markets Services (CMS) licence from MAS, enabling regulated tokenised asset fund management in Singapore.
12. Korean regulators imposed record $1.4bn in penalties on 5 banks for improper ELS sales.
13. Hong Kong Monetary Authority launched comprehensive Fintech Promotion Blueprint to advance AI, distributed ledger technologies, and cybersecurity preparedness in financial sector.

💰 Financing Announcements

1. Ekko, a Vietnamese Earned Wage Access (EWA) platform, raised $4.2M.
2. Wonder, a Hong Kong payments startup, raised $12M in venture debt from HSBC to fund business growth in the Asia Pacific region.
3. Fingular, a Southeast Asian neobanking startup, raised $10m credit line.

If you’ve made it this far - thanks! As always, you can always reach me at osborne@thisweekinfintech.com. I’d genuinely appreciate any and all feedback. If you liked what you read, please consider sharing or subscribing.

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