The 63 year old diamond trader is wanted by the Indian legislative authorities for the charges of money laundering, criminal conspiracy, corruption, cheating and dishonesty. He is also accused in the PNB scam case. He is an Indian born citizen who later took citizenship in Antigua and Barbuda in 2017. He owns the Gitanjali Group, which is a retail jewellery group with an extensive network of showrooms across India.
It was in 1985 that he took over Gitanjali Gems from his father which was the beginning of all the frauds to unfold. From various credible sources, it can be learnt that he is admitted in the Dominica China Friendship hospital in Roseau as of 30th May 2021.
On 26th May, after lots of efforts from law enforcement authorities, the scammer cum trader was arrested in the island country of Dominica.
Mehul Choksi was admitted to the hospital after he tests negative for Covid -19.
29 May 2021
Mehul Choksi was seen in custody with his left hand and eyes bruised.
27 May 2021
Mehul Choksi’s lawyer clarifies that he can only be deported to Antigua and not to India according to Immigration and Passport Act Section 17 and 23 since he is an antiguan citizen.
27 May 2021
The Antiguan Prime Minister Gaston Browne has requested Dominica to deport Choksi directly to India. If he is deported to Antigua, then he will be able to enjoy the protections given for a citizen.
23 May 2021
Mehul Choski goes missing from Antigua and Barbada. His lawyer and himself says that he was abducted.
The Beginning of the End for Mehul Choksi
The history of a long drawn out bank fraud came into light as PMLA issued non-bailable arrest warrants against Mehul Choksi, Nirav Modi and Neeshal Deepak Modi. They have been involved in a $1.8 billion scam in the second largest public sector bank, Punjab National Bank. The bank claims that Choksi along with Nirav Modi colluded with the employees to illegally obtain money from the bank.
Although he claims to be innocent even in an open letter, it does not go along with the fact that he left to the Carribean nation Antigua and Barbada just before the scam was disclosed.
His oath taking as a citizen of the same country a few days the after disclosure further adds oil to the fire. Later, the PMLA authorities responsible for the investigation found out that 41 properties that were held by the Enforcement Directorate in the name of Mehul Choksi were money laundering assets.
They ordered for the attachment of these properties worth 1210 crore. Following the order, a mall in Kolkata, 15 flats and 17 office premises in Mumbai, a four-acre farm house in Alibaug and 231 acres of land at locations like Nashik, Nagpur, Panvel in Maharashtra and Villupuram in Tamil Nadu were attached by the ED in keeping up with the Prevention of Money Laundering Act.
There was confirmed information that Mehul Choksi was there in Antigua and Barbuda. However, he went missing on May 23,2021. His car was later discovered in the Jolly Harbour area which strengthened the assumptions that he escaped to Cuba. However, the truth was revealed as he was confirmed to be in the Carribean country of Dominica.
Since he was trying to flee to Cuba, this attempt can be used by the CBI to strengthen their claims for extradition. Another twist to the plot came when Choksi’s advocate alleged that he was kidnapped by someone who Choksi believes to be an Indian and Antiguan police into Dominica in a boat.
The Story Now of Mehul Choksi
The High Court of Justice Commonwealth of Dominica has stayed the extradition order of the scammer. The pictures of his swollen eyes and injured left hand are flooding the social media.
The efforts of Indian agencies have not ceased. They continued to call the Antiguan government to extradite him by claiming that he is in fact an Indian citizen and has an Interpol Red Corner Notice issued in his name. Another group of people says that the Red Corner Notice cannot be used in this case since the task of locating the criminal is already done.
At the same time, the Antiguan opposition party is clearly making use of this opportunity to support Choksi against the extradition claims of India. It is widely perceived as their attempts to later procure campaign funding from Choksi as a return gift.
Mehul Choksi leaves India for the USA. He fled through Mumbai International Airport
Punjab National Bank files complaint against Mehul Choksi and Nirav Modi for defrauding the bank by colluding with the bank employees
CBI files probe against the scammers (Mehul Choksi, Nirav Modi, Nishal Modi). Raids and searches were also done.
February 2018
The amount involved in the fraud was disclosed to be $1.7 billion.
CBI files case against the Gitanjali group.
PNB CEO announces that the losses are hoped to be compensated in 6 months.
Union Bank of India announces its exposure of $300 million in association with the PNB scam while of State Bank of India, it was $212 million.
Choksi claims to be innocent.
July 2018
Interpol at the request of CBI issues Red Corner Notice against Mehul Choksi.
Choksi reaches Antigua after taking oath of citizenship earlier in 2018.
March 2019
The UK Home Secretary accepts the extradition request of CBI and the files were to Westminster court.
May 2021
Mehul Choksi goes missing.
Later he gets caught in Dominica.
CBI is waiting for the clearance of extradition.
FAQ
What did Mehul Choksi do?
Mehul Choksi and his nephew Nirav Modi are the key accused in the 2018-Punjab National Bank (PNB) scam which was estimated to be around ₹13,500 crores.
When did Mehul Choksi leave India?
Mehul Choksi left India on 7 January, 2018 and few days later, the PNB scam was disclosed.
Where is Mehul Choksi right now?
Mehul Choksi had been staying in Antigua and Barbuda since January 2018.
The Covid cases in India has seen a surge due to the second wave in the country. Amidst the rise in cases and the shortage of vaccines certain Indian companies have announced that they would provide vaccination for their employees.
A handful of companies have also announced that they would provide the vaccination to the families of their employees as well as the third parties involved with the company’s day to day activities. Let’s look at the different companies who have announced that they would provide vaccines to the employees.
Wipro had announced that it would start its Covid vaccination drive for its employees in their Electronic city campus in Bangalore. A spokesperson of Wipro had conveyed that the company is taking all the measures in order to start vaccination camps in all their other branches in the country.
Sony India
Sony India had provided a policy for its employees which is a Mediclaim policy in order to cover the expenses for the Covid treatment of their employees at home. The company has announced that it is in the process of setting up vaccination camps for their employees.
Indian Bank Association
The Indian Bank Association had made an announcement conveying that the vaccination of the Bank employees should be given the top most priority. They added that around 10 lakh bank employees should be vaccinated immediately and the expenses should be reimbursed. But the association had left the decision towards the individual banks in regards to the vaccination.
Hindustan Uniliver
A HUL spokesperson had conveyed that the company is looking forward to vaccinate all its employees as government has given permission to provide vaccination for the individuals above the age of 18. However, the shortage in the availability of vaccines have been a setback.
Amitav Mukherji who is the HR head of ITC have conveyed that the managers have been designated by the company to conduct the vaccination drives across various locations in the country by tying up with healthcare facilities. ITC has also announced that they would provide the vaccination drive towards their service providers as well as their supply chain partners.
TCS and Infosys
TCS have announced that they are working on various types of models in order to conduct vaccination drives with direct partnership with their suppliers. In the same way the HR head of Infosys has conveyed that they are in discussions with the healthcare providers and vaccine suppliers.
Reliance Industries
Nita Ambani who is a non-executive director of Reliance Industries had conveyed in a letter to their employees that the company will provide vaccination for them as well as their family members. It is estimated that the company has a count of 2,00,000 people.
All India Petroleum Dealers Association (AIPDA)
Ajay Bansal who is the President of the association has conveyed that the vaccination of all the petrol pump attendants and staffs should be given the top most priority and that they should be considered as essential workers.
He has conveyed that the Government should ask the oil marketing companies or find some other mechanism to vaccinate them as they were considered as an essential worker during the lockdown and were not considered eligible to receive the vaccination jabs.
Share of People who received at least one does of vaccine
Indigo
Indigo has also announced that they would vaccinate their employees and their family members. The company has announced that they are working towards providing vaccinations in a phased manner so that their operations doesn’t get affected.
Capgemini
Capgemini had also announced that they would provide vaccinations to all their employees and also their dependents. The company has also tied up with wellness consultants in order to resolve the doubts and queries related to vaccination.
upGrad
upGrad had also announced that they would provide vaccination for its employees as well as their family members. The ed-tech company has announced that they would provide vaccines to full-time employees, interns, contract-based employees as well as their ex-employees.
Betterplace
Betterplace which is a tech-based company has announced that they would cover the full cost of the vaccination cost of their employees and their dependants. The company is also providing a day off for their employees on the day of their vaccination.
Atos which is an IT and a consulting firm has announced that it would cover the cost of the vaccination for its employees as well as their dependents under the medical insurance programme of the company. The company also conveyed that they would work together with local healthcare providers of the companies to implement the vaccination programme.
ICICI Bank
ICICI Bank has also announced that they would provide vaccination for their employees and their immediate family members. The bank has conveyed that it was a gesture of appreciation from the company towards its employees for dedicating their service during the tough times.
HDFC Bank
HDFC Bank has also announced that they would provide vaccinations for over 1 lakh employees and their family members. The bank has announced that they would reimburse the expenses for the mandated two doses of the vaccines.
Piramal Enterprises Limited
The company has announced that they would provide vaccines for their employees and their immediate family members and the choice of getting vaccinated is optional for their employees. They have set up a help desk across their offices for answering the queries of the employees.
FAQ
When did Covid vaccinations start in India?
16 march, 2021
How many Covid vaccines are produced daily in India?
This means, on a daily basis, 28.33 lakh doses of the COVID-19 vaccine are produced in the country.
Are Indian companies providing covid vaccine to its employees?
Yes, Many major companies in India are providing Covid vaccination for free to its employees.
Conclusion
However, these are the major companies that have announced to provide vaccinations to their employees. Almost all the companies have decided to provide free vaccination to all their employees, in which around 70% of the companies are offering it to the dependents of their employees as well.
On 23 April 2021, the Reserve Bank of India had barred American Express and Diners Club International Limited from onboarding new customers to their platform. The ban is expected to come into effect from May 1. Let’s look at why both the payment system operators American Express and Diners Club International Limited were banned by RBI from adding new customers.
The Reserve Bank of India had initiated a ban for the payment system operators from onboarding new customers into their network as they were not able to follow the norms with the data storage put forth by the RBI.
The Reserve Bank of India in a statement said that both the entities have been found to be non-compliant in respect to the directions on storage of data of the payment systems. The RBI has added that the action towards both the entities was taken based on the powers which are under Section 17 of the PSS Act.
American Express Banking Corp and Diners Club International Ltd are payment system operators in the country who has the authorization to operate card networks in India under PSS Act (Payment and Settlement Systems Act), 2007.
American Express Banking Corp is a multinational company that focuses on financial services. It is located in New York, the United States. The company was founded in the year 1850. American Express is considered to be the 23rd most valuable brand in the world according to the Forbes 2017 list.
Some of the products offered by the company are Charge Cards, Traveler’s cheque, Credit Cards, corporate banking, etc. In India according to a report by Financial Express, American Express has a market share of around 2.53 % of the total market with around 15.6 lakh credit cards outstanding.
Diners Club International Ltd
Diners Club International is also known as DCI is a charge card company. It is a finance-based company that has its headquarters in the United States. The company was founded in the year 1950. Diner Club International was the first payment card company in the world.
The company is owned by Discover Financial Services. Some of the products of Diner Club International are charge cards and credit cards. In India, Diners Club International distributes its cards exclusively through HDFC Bank and the exact number of active users is unknown.
Why did RBI restricted American Express, Diners Club from adding more customers
In the year 2018, in a notification, the Reserve Bank of India had noticed that all the payment system providers did not stored the data of the payments in the country. The notification said that there was a significant growth witnessed by India in the payment ecosystem and such systems depend completely on technology.
The notification added that such an ecosystem has a necessity for a continuous measure of safety and security that were best in class.
The Reserve Bank of India had then directed all the system providers to ensure that the entire data which are related to payment systems should be stored in a system that is only in India.
The data which are stored should include the full end-to-end transaction details, information, carried, collected, and processed as part of the message or payment instruction. This was mentioned by RBI in its notification.
If there is any foreign transaction, those data can be stored in the foreign country if it is required. The compliances with the new rules were supposed to be followed by the system providers within 6 months and they had to report the same to the Reserve Bank of India.
In addition to this, they were also required to submit a report which should be approved by the board a System Audit Report (SAR). It should be conducted by the CERT-In empanelled auditor within the time duration that is specified.
The ban of American Express Banking Corp and Diners Club International Ltd by RBI is because they have failed to follow the statement given by RBI in regards to storing the data which was issued two years ago.
In India, American Express offers a full range of travel, financial and network service products.
What type of credit card is Diners Club?
Diners Club is an International Credit Card.
Who owns RBI?
RBI has been fully owned by the Government of India since its nationalisation in 1949.
Conclusion
The ban on both the entities would not affect the existing customers. The Reserve Bank of India had clarified in a statement that the ban will have no impact on the customers of both the companies.
On 26 April 2021, the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) has approved an appointment of the new Managing Director and CEO of the National Commodity and Derivatives Exchange Ltd (NCDEX). The new Managing Director and CEO of National Commodity and Derivatives Exchange Ltd is Arun Raste. Let’s look at who is Arun Raste, the new MD and CEO of NCDEX.
Arun Raste is currently working as the Executive Director of the National Dairy Development Board (NDDB) of India. He is also serving as the director on the board of Indian Immunological Limited which is based in Hyderabad and also the director on the board of Mother Dairy Fruit Vegetable Pvt Ltd. Which is based in Delhi.
He had earlier worked with companies such as Kotak Mahindra Bank, IDFC Bank, ACC Cement, NABARD and also a non-profit NGO IRFT.
He has done a bachelor’s degree in economics and also a master’s degree in economics. He also holds a post-graduation diploma in marketing management.
He has an interest in the areas such as BoP finance, Business Strategy, CSR, marketing, Corporate Planning and NGO management.
Seminars
He was invited by the United States State Department for ‘The International Visitor Leadership programme’(IVLP). He has also been part of various conferences and seminars which include the ones at UNCTAD, World Social Forum, IFAT Conference, WTO ministerial, Toyo University Tokyo, Kindai University Nara Japan, PSE Group in European Parliament, Murdoch University Perth Australia, and so on.
He has also published various research papers in National and International Journals.
Now he has been appointed as the Managing Director and CEO of National Commodity and Derivatives Exchange (NCDEX) for a period of 5 years.
What is NCDEX
National Commodity and Derivative Exchange is a commodity exchange platform in India. It is an online commodity exchange platform that provides the market participants a platform to trade in commodities and derivatives.
NCDEX was founded in the year 2003 and has its headquarters located in Mumbai, India. NCDEX is a public limited company that is fully owned by the Government of India. NCDEX has offices in other places which include Delhi, Hyderabad, Jaipur, Kolkata, Indore and Ahmedabad.
What is NCDEX
NCDEX is an leading agricultural commodity exchange in India. It offers value chain services for the entire post-harvest agricultural commodities.
Some of the key investors of NCDEX include National Stock Exchange of India Ltd, National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development, Life Insurance Corporation of India, Oman India Joint Investment Fund, Investcorp Private Equity Fund, Build India Capital Advisors LLP, Indian Farmers Fertilizer, Cooperative Ltd, Punjab National Bank and Canara Bank.
NCDEX is predominantly an exchange with leadership in the agri commodity segments, while MCX has leadership in the area of gold, metals and oil.
Where is Ncdex located?
NCDEX headquarters are located in Mumbai and offers facilities to its members from the centres located throughout India.
What is full form Ncdex?
National Commodity & Derivatives Exchange Limited is full form of NCDEX.
Conclusion
Earlier in this month Vijay Kumar who was the former Managing Director and the CEO of NCDEX had left the position from the exchange after the completion of his extended term. Later, SEBI had appointed Arun Raste as the new CEO and MD of NCDEX.
Citi Bank had recently announced that it will exit retail banking operations in India and 12 other countries. The other countries include Australia, Indonesia, Korea, Bahrain, Malaysia, Philippines, Poland, Taiwan, Russia, Thailand and Vietnam. Citi bank is one of the largest foreign banks in India. Let’s look at the below article to understand why Citi bank is leaving the Indian Consumer banking market.
Citibank had entered Indian retail banking in the year 1902. The business of Citi Bank in India consists of Credit Card business, retail banking, wealth management and home loans. The company has around 35 branches across India and around 29 lakh retail customers.
As of March 2020, Citi bank has around 12 lakh bank accounts and about 22 lakh credit card accounts. The bank has around 5.9% market share in the digital payments and around 6 % market share in credit card spends.
According to FY2020 Citi bank has a 15.4 % share in the market share of loans among the foreign banks in India. As of 31 March 2020, the total deposits in the bank were around INR 1.57 trillion which includes the deposits from other banks as well as customers.
It is estimated that around 26% of the foreign portfolio investments are through Citi bank India.
Reasons Why Citibank is leaving Indian consumer banking market
American based banking major Citi bank is reducing its consumer operations as part of a broader strategic review. The new Chief Executive Officer, Jane Fraser is slimming down the operations in order to focus on the wealth management business since Citibank lacks the scale to compete in the retail banking operations.
Jane Fraser while announcing Citi bank’s quarterly results said that they have decided that they are going to double down on wealth as a result of the ongoing refresh of their strategy. He said that, while all the 13 markets including India have excellent business, Citi Bank doesn’t have the scale they require to compete.
Jane Fraser added on saying they believe that their capital, investment dollars and other resources are deployed better against the higher returning opportunities which include the wealth management and the institutional businesses in India.
Other Reasons for the exit from Indian banking market
One of the other reasons for the exit from the retail market in India syncs with the trend of full or part exit of foreign banks in India from the year 2009. This is mainly because of the high capital and various other regulatory requirements in India.
These factors have pushed various foreign banks to retreat into their domestic markets in order to protect their profitability. Certain foreign banks such as Barclays, HSBC, Standard Chartered bank, etc. have curbed their operations in India and other banks such as J.P Morgan, Goldman Sachs, etc. have surrendered their banking licenses.
In addition to it, foreign banks do not find the small number of profits received from retail banks in India commercially attractive. This is one of the major reasons to exit the retail market when the domestic banks are in the process of finding more retail customers.
Citigroup has said that it will now focus on operating its global consumer banking business solely from four markets such as Singapore, Hong Kong, London and the UAE. The company said that it would continue its corporate and institutional banking business in the markets where it is ending planning to end the consumer operations.
In India, Citigroup will focus on offshoring or global business support rendering its services from major centers in Mumbai, Pune, Bengaluru, Chennai and Gurugram.
Ashu Khullar who is the CEO of Citi India said that India is a strategic talent hub for Citi and he added on saying that they will continue to tap into the rich talent pool which is available in the country to grow Citi’s five solution centers which are a support for their global footprint.
He also added that, there was no immediate change to their operations and there wouldn’t be any immediate impact to the colleagues as a result of this announcement.
Citi is not closing down its business in India but it is changing hands after it gets a requisite regulatory approval and a proper buyer. The bank said that till the time of the sale there will be no impact for their customer as well as their 21,000 employees.
FAQ
Does Citibank have branches in India?
Citibank currently has 35 branches in India with 19,235 employees.
Is Citi and Citigroup the same?
Citigroup Inc. or Citi (stylized as citi) is an American multinational investment bank and financial services corporation headquartered in New York City. Citigroup owns Citicorp, the holding company for Citibank, as well as several international subsidiaries.
Who is the CEO of Citibank India?
Ashu Khullar is the current CEO of Citibank India.
Conclusion
Citi had become one of the largest foreign banks in India over the years and its decision to close down the consumer business in the country marks the end of an era.
The global payments giant Mastercard has announced that it will invest $100 million in Airtel Africa’s mobile money business which runs under Airtel Mobile Commerce BV (AMC BV). Let’s look at the information regarding the deal and the future plans of the company.
Airtel Mobile Commerce BV is currently the company that undertakes and controls the major mobile money operations of Airtel Africa. The company also intends to operate and own all the mobile money business in 14 other countries of Africa which are operating under Airtel Africa.
Airtel Mobile Commerce BV’s services are mainly focused on the unbanked market of the 14 countries of Airtel Africa. Their services include mobile wallet deposits, mobile wallet withdrawals, commercial payments, merchant payments, provision of loans, the opportunity for savings, benefit transfers, virtual credit cards, and international money transfers.
Currently, the company has around 21 million users for its set of mobile payment services. The company had generated a revenue of $110 million in the recent quarter. They have an underlying EBITDA (Earnings before income, tax, depreciation, and amortization) of $54 million.
Airtel Mobile Commerce BV operates one of the largest financial services in the continent. It has a valuation of around $2.65 billion.
Recent Investments to Airtel Africa’s mobile money
Airtel Mobile Commerce BV received a recent investment of $200 million from TPG’s Rise Fund. The company will own a 7.55% stake in the Airtel Africa’s mobile money service company AMC BV.
After closing the deal with TPG’s Rise Fund the company had plans to have a discussion on selling additional minority stakes of the company which will be around 25% of the issued share capital. They had plans to sell it to potential investors.
Airtel Mobile Commerce BV had announced its most recent investor which is the global payments giant Mastercard. Mastercard has announced that it would invest an amount of $100 million in the company. The company will own a 3.775% stake in Airtel Africa’s mobile money business after the completion of the deal.
The transaction of Mastercard is expected to close in two different portions. The first portion is expected to be closed at $75 million which will be finalized by the next 4 months and an amount of $50 million to be invested in the second phase.
In addition to the investments, they received from TPG’s Rise Fund and the global payments giant Mastercard, Airtel’s Africa is raising funds by selling off some assets. It is reported that recently the company has sold around 1,400 telecommunication towers to Helios in Madagascar and Malawi. The transaction is expected to be $119 million.
Both the companies Airtel Africa and Helios to trade tower assets in Chad and Gabon. The details regarding this transaction are not yet disclosed.
Airtel Africa and Mastercard are two individual firms that are stronger to one another. Both the companies had already got into a deal in 2019. The deal provided an opportunity for Airtel Africa’s 100 million subscribers to receive access to the global network of Mastercard.
There 2019 partnership did not have any money exchange. In the most recent deal of Airtel Africa and Mastercard has extended their commercial agreements and have signed a new commercial structure that is focused on improving their partnership in different countries around the globe.
They are planning to concentrate on areas such as issuing of cards, payment processing, payment gateway, merchant acceptance, remittance solutions, etc. amongst the other services provided by the companies.
The CEO of Airtel Africa Raghunath Mandava said, that they were pleased to welcome Mastercard as an investor in their mobile money business. He also added that, this partnership is a continuation of their strategy to increase the minority shareholding of the company’s mobile money business. He said that they have a further intention of listing the business in the next four years.
The CEO also added that they are working towards strengthening their existing relationship with Mastercard which will help them realize the full potential of their considerable opportunity. This is to improve their financial inclusion in all the countries they are currently operating.
Airtel Mobile Commerce BV’s plan of selling the minority stake of the company to Ride Fund, Mastercard, and other potential investors is based on the telecom operator Airtel Africa’s belief to raise enough funds to monetize its mobile money business.
FAQ
What is Airtel Mastercard?
The Mastercard virtual card allows Airtel Money customers, to make payments to local and global online merchants that accept Mastercard cards.
Is Airtel Money wallet safe?
Airtel Money Wallet is an RBI approved payments wallet.
Where is the headquarters of Airtel?
The headquarters of Airtel is located in New Delhi, India.
Conclusion
The company’s efforts are to work towards the pursuit of investment opportunities, asset monetization, and ultimately reduction of debt in the company.
Company Profile is an initiative by StartupTalky to publish verified information on different startups and organizations. The content in this post has been approved by Finin.
Suman Gandham was fascinated by the Neobanking wave in Europe. A neobank is a type of digital bank without any branches. Neobanking is completely online, rather than having physical presence at a location.
Founded in February 2019, Finin is India’s first, full-fledged consumer neobank to go live in the country. Since the launch in December 2020, Finin has seen about 4000 account opens and is looking forward to many in the coming days. One can open Finin Savings account in under 2 minutes with minimum KYC. Finin is a hyper-personalized neobanking platform, made with the purpose to bridge gaps using technology and help people develop a better relationship with money by simplifying antiquated banking services.
StartupTalky interviewed Suman Gandham (Founder of Finin) to get an idea on the Startup Story of Finin and to have a closer look on Finin Success Story, Funding, Business Model, Startup Idea, Founders, Growth & more…
Founded in 2019, Bengaluru based startup Finin is India’s first, full-fledged consumer neobank to go live in the country.
Finin provides users with a savings account powered by SBM and issues a VISA debit card. Finin helps empower users with Goal driven solutions via converting them into highly savings-driven financial disciplinarians through smart & relevant notifications, hyper-personalized solutions and nudge theorem to guide them into the 50-30-20 rule seamlessly.
Finin – Industry and Target Market
Finin is relevant across industries and market sizes and essentially a relevant product for anybody who has a smartphone and uses PFM (Personal Financial Management) or banking apps.
There is market size of 0.76 Billion, Finin can tap into. Finin started by targeting Tier 1 and Tier 2 cities. Its main focus is white collar job holders with a salary range of 30k to 90k per month, freelancers, students and millennials.
Finin breaks its user base into 3 broad umbrellas – Spenders, Savers and Borrowers. The aim here is to convert Spenders and Borrowers into Savers and funnel them into the Invest category.
Suman Gandham and Sudheer Maram are the Co-founders of Finin
Suman Gandham and Sudheer Maram
When Suman Gandham, Founder of Finin, came back from Europe with the idea to start a neobank in India, he was already bouncing ideas off of Sudheer Maram, co-founder of Finin who is also from a Financial background.
They both share an entrepreneurial mindset and are childhood friends. They soon joined hands to start working on Finin in February 2019. Sudheer did a BE in Computer Science from Madras University. He has been heavily involved in the Financial space and worked as a senior analyst with Infosys. He heads Marketing & Operations in Finin while Suman handles the tech, product and business side of the company.
Finin founders and team
The company has 15 employees currently. The work culture is highly motivated, driven and at most times fun.
“We work and eat together like a family. We celebrate small victories and help each other across departments” – Says Suman Gandham (Founder, Finin)
The early core team was a well picked list of recommendations from friends and family and the singular motive was to identify those candidates who had a passion for the idea and the appetite to work in a competitive environment.
Luckily for Finin, the core team is aligned to the vision and mission of the company and are keen followers of the Fintech and product innovation space. Its core team members are from Fintech backgrounds. Most of them have worked in startups where they have helped products go from 0-1 and everybody has a shared affinity for the problem Finin is determined to solve.
Suman was a Fintech VC in Barcelona and was fascinated by the neobanking wave that gripped the continent. Having observed some of the most successful neobanks and their inner workings, Suman was clear that a concept like this in india was absolutely essential.
He was already in conversation with Sudheer Maram, his childhood friend, a fintech space enthusiast and a finance industry person to brainstorm and lay the foundation of the idea. Sudheer, jumped the bandwagon and soon in Feb 2019, the company was founded.
“A lot of people claim that India is underbanked, however the reality is that it is indeed overbanked. The only loose end is that the solutions offered by most banks are strikingly similar in a manner to say that they lack personalization, apt utilization of data or technological inclusions to make the customer journey seamless and intuitive. The banking infrastructure is indeed a cumbersome and tedious journey.A hyper-personalized neobanking platform like ours is made with the purpose to bridge gaps using technology and help people develop a better relationship with money by simplifying antiquated banking services” Says Suman Gandham, Founder of Finin
Finin is based out of Bangalore, India and was founded in February 2019. It went live on 2nd December 2019 as the first consumer neobank in India. Finin is an online-only consumer neobanking solution partnered with SBM Bank India. By creating an account, one essentially creates a Finin Savings account and is issued a Visa Signature powered debit card.
Finin – Product, Features and How it Works
Finin has created an easy-to-do onboarding sequence that lets a person create a Finin Savings account in under 2 minutes with minimum KYC. Once the SBM powered bank account is created, a VISA Finin debit card is automatically issued and delivered to the user. While the card arrives, the virtual card has a lot of functions which allows for online payments and transactions.
Further to this, a user has the opportunity to link their other bank accounts to the app to get a rounded view of all transactions and balance in one-app view. This in fact is a very sought after feature as per Finin users.
The Finin app also gives one the functionality to create monthly budgets, basis which nudge theorem, AI powered analytics and insights are used to send users the save-spend data, recommendations on the best practices, reminders on trial subscription cancellations, bill payments, tracking refunds and even highly personalized notifications such as whether a user must opt in for merchant embedded features like Zomato Gold or Swiggy Super.
The nudge theorem employs the 50-30-20 rule to guide users effortlessly towards smart financial choices. One can create Goals on the app to practice discipline and allocate a weekly or monthly amount towards this goal. This goal comes with an added feature called Round off transactions feature which when opted for, an extra amount of the users preference is deducted and saved aside for the Goal. This is akin to finding money in your old jeans pocket.
The main idea of Finin is to convert spenders and borrowers into savers and eventually investors so that they move down the road to financial discipline and further still financial independence.
Right from a high utility neobanking app offering improved features such as easy transactions, easy card management which includes blocking or unblocking a card at the click of a button or enabling/ disabling contactless payments, international payments, ATM withdrawals and online transaction through the app easily and limitlessly, Finin also offers a suite of wealth management features such as budgeting and goal management. These features come gratis with nudge theorem powered insights and analytics that will not only give one a fullscape view of finances but also guide one into financial planning, discipline and independence.
Every new concept comes with its fair share of hurdles but nothing that has been difficult to overcome. We have fostered some very meaningful partnerships to align with our vision and offer the best version of the product we intended to create – Says Suman (Founder, Finin)
Finin is an acronym for Financial independence and that is how the team arrived at the name. The tagline, a new approach to banking was in fact exactly what the founders were sure to create. The logo is a tiered arrow pointing upwards indicating monetary stability, growth and independence.
Finin Logo
Finin – Business Model and Revenue Model
Finin is an app-based platform available in iOS and android devices. The founders intently looking at the user behavior and based on the findings, they we will be hashing out a revenue model at a later stage.
Finin – Startup Launch and Customer Retention
Finin team have been running a waitlist for a less than a year and nearly 10,000 people were already on the waitlist. So Finin’s beta and first set of customers came from here.
Finin noticed the largest influx from word of mouth marketing. The Finin team did things right by talking about Finin way before launch and onboarding a waitlist of exclusive early users. This also created noise among Fintech buffs and others in general. Customer retention is purely based on the features already implemented and the future roadmaps.
“We strive to offer impeccable and quick customer service which also aids with Customer retention” Says Finin Founder
The adoption of a new concept within the Indian population which is so hardwired to use tried and tested banking names, is probably the only challenge in paper. However, the Finin team have been able to navigate through this seamlessly by creating awareness, addressing the problem and solution together and even propagating financial literacy.
There is a general unawareness of finances and money management across India. Growing up, everybody is told to save but not quite told how. FDs and RDs ruled the roost but the general populace is unaware of smart financial decisions, the right financial terms and jargons and cannot, due to lack of awareness, pick the right options for themselves when it comes to selecting the best financial manager suite.
Banking institutions lack personalization due to their one-size-fits-all approach. It is also cumbersome to gain a 360 degree view of financial management and investments through such institutions. Having identified this problem, Finin aims to work as a go-to app for everyone’s money management.
Finin – Marketing Campaign
sincThe team at Finin noticed that quirky and relevant campaigns do extremely well. It ran a series called #NoWayHosay on its social media platforms. It also ran a #CashAgainstHumanity contest which really boosted Finin’s traction.
Since Finin’s launch in December 2019, it has seen about 4000 account opens and many more are coming on a day on day basis. The product adoption has been excellent as per customer feedback.
Finin raised an undisclosed amount of Pre-Series A from Unicorn India Ventures, Point one capital and Astir Ventures and are in the process of going for Series A round.
Finin’s funding details are as follows-
Date
Amount
Series
Investors
July 2020
Undisclosed
Pre Series A
Unicorn India Ventures, Point one capital, Astir Ventures
Finin – Advisors and Mentors
Finin’s Investors are its mentors – Unicorn India Ventures, Point one capital and Astir Ventures
Finin – Recognition and Achievements
Finin has been featured across podcasts, media houses, publications and much more through the course of 2020. Some notable ones are Yourstory, Mint, Business Today, CNBC TV18, ET, etc
Finin – Future Plans
Finin has a lot of feature roll outs planned in the near future. Mutual funds, investments, lending and credit cards are a few of them.
Finin – FAQs
What is Finin?
Finin is India’s first, full-fledged consumer neobank to go live in the country. Finin provides users with a savings account powered by SBM and issues a VISA debit card.
Who are Finin Founders?
Suman Gandham and Sudheer Maram are the Co-founders of Finin
What is Neobanking?
A neobank is a type of digital bank without any branches. Neobanking is completely online, rather than having physical presence at a location.
How much is Finin Funding?
In July 2020, Finin raised an undisclosed amount of Pre-Series A from Unicorn India Ventures, Point one capital and Astir Ventures
Who are Finin investors?
Unicorn India Ventures, Point one capital and Astir Ventures
What is the USP of Finin?
Finin provides a high utility neobanking app offering improved and personalized features such as easy transactions, card management, wealth management features, budgeting and goal management and more.
Banks are the place where individuals park their money. Bank’s indicate that your life’s savings are secure in their lockers or vaults. But as everything is getting digital, today banks deal with data and most of the transactions are online with just a click of few buttons and these automations and convenient banking techniques cause a lot of drawbacks if not used properly. These have created a lot of mistakes in the Industry where the customers and clients have lost their trust in the banks.
Here are some of the Biggest Blunders of Banking History
Citi Bank was acting as a loan agent between the Cosmetic company Revlon and its creditors. The bank had to pay an amount of USD 8 Million to the lenders. In February 2021 Citi bank paid an amount of USD 900 Million (around INR 6,530 crores) to the lenders. Instead of paying the interest amount to the lenders the bank paid the full loan amount. Citi bank had notified the creditors within 24 hours of the mistake but yet it hadn’t received back around USD 500 Million from around 10 others.
The bank moved to the court where the Judge said that the issue was in clash between two principles: money which is sent by mistake is supposed to be returned but if the lender is paid back in full, the creditor should not have to worry. Here, the bank had transferred to money to the people whom they owed money and the receiver had no reason to believe that it was an error.
The Judge also said that Citi group transferred the money on 11 August 2020 when the due date for the payment of interest was on 28 August 2020 and the only way the interest would have been a due on 11 August 2020 only if Revlon was paying the principal amount early.
As the lenders did not feel that the amount transferred was by mistake Citi Bank would lose around half a Million USD which is considered as the “Biggest Blunder in the Banking History”. The creditors are still not free to use the money as USD 504 Million is still frozen.
KfW bank “Germany’s dumbest bank
KfW bank accidently sent around 5 billion Euros (INR 43,966 crores) to accounts with four other banks. The bank has claimed that it was human error as an experienced programmer has committed an error which made their software automatically to transfer the amounts. The Bloomberg news has said that around 6 billion Euros have been transferred. The error was pointed out by the German Central Bank and KfW had claimed that it had immediately rectified the error not causing any financial damage.
There was a similar incident which had happened during the year 2008 where the bank transferred 320 Million Euros to Lehman brothers on the day, they filed their bankruptcy.
KfW was termed as “Germany’s dumbest bank” by the mass – market daily Bild.
Deutsche Bank’s 26 Billion Euros Blunder
The bank accidently sent 26 Billion Euros to an account in Deutsche Boerse AG’s Eurex clearinghouse in 2018. The bank had claimed that it was an operational error which happened during the movement of the collateral between Deutsche Bank’s principal accounts and Deutsche Bank’s Eurex account. The spokesman of Deutsche bank said that the errors was identified within a matter of minutes and was rectified. He also added that they had taken measures to not repeat the mistakes. This mistake had cost the company’s shares to fall by 25% that year.
There was another incident which happened in 2015 where the bank transferred around USD 6 Billion to a client’s account in the hedge fund in U. S, the bank had received back the money the next day. It has told that the transfer of money was made by a junior foreign exchange sales department employee, when the boss was on vacation.
PayPal’s USD 92 quadrillion blunder
PayPal accidentally transferred $92 Quadrillion to a man in Delaware
PayPal the online – money transfer company had accidently transferred an amount of USD 92 quadrillion to a man in Delaware named Chris Reynolds during the year 2013. The man said he was shocked when he received his monthly statement through an e-mail.
Reynolds was a PayPal customer for the past 10 years and used it to buy and sell items on eBay mostly vintage car parts. He has told that he usually wouldn’t spend more than $100 a month.
PayPal had admitted the error and paid an amount to Reynold as a compensation which was not disclosed. PayPal had admitted that it was a technical mistake.
Conclusion
The above are some important Blunders committed by the banking industry. There are a lot more blunders and with the implementation of technology the blunders have increased. The banks need to train the employees with the new technologies and make sure that the blunders don’t repeat. Updating their security systems and updating their employee’s knowledge on a regular basis will help to an extent to avoid these mistakes.
Alan Joseph
