“An RBI letter asking “All Non-Bank Pre-Paid Instruments (PPI) Issuers” to cease issuing cards has led to the ‘buy now pay later’ (BNPL) sector expressing concerns. The BNPL sector: Participants in the sector include companies that provide PPIs to customers with little creditworthiness, like students and young professionals.”

“The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) is extending the deadline for card-on-file (CoF) tokenisation by another three months to September 30 as transaction processing based on such tokens is yet to gain traction across categories of merchants. It was mandated that no entity in the card transaction or in the payment chain, other than the card issuers and / or card networks, can store the CoF data, and any such data stored previously be purged. The initial deadline was January 1, which was extended by six months.”

“The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has unveiled its ‘Payments Vision 2025’, which intends to boost the country’s e-payments ecosystem. The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has released a design for payment system regulation that intends to give customers quick, easy, and affordable electronic payment choices.   As part of its Vision 2025, the RBI outlined regulations for BigTech and FinTechs, as well as buy-now-pay-later (BNPL) systems and the creation of a central bank digital currency (CBDC).”

“While the Reserve Bank of India’s (RBI’s) decision to allow linking of RuPay credit cards to Unified Payments Interface (UPI) has been received positively by the industry as it is expected to open up a big payment universe, an uncertainty over the pricing structure has left players seeking clarity on how such a move will be implemented. Whether it is a credit card, debit card, or UPI, the consumer doesn’t incur any charge, it is the merchant who bears the cost in terms of merchant discount rate (MDR). While there is no MDR on UPI, for debit cards, it is capped at 0.9 per cent. There is, however, no cap on MDR for credit cards. Typically, credit cards (non-RuPay) have MDRs of 200 bps vs 50 bps MDR on debit cards. Rupay debit cards have no MDR whereas Rupay credit cards typically have lower MDRs vs those on Visa/Mastercard. Also, usually, in MDR, the issuing bank takes 60 per cent, and the balance is shared between the network provider (Visa, Mastercard, etc.) and acquirer….When asked about the pricing structure, T Rabi Sankar, deputy governor, RBI, said: “How the pricing structure will work out we will have to see because it’s something that the banks and system entities have to do. At this point, we will introduce the arran­gement and see how the pricing goes”….Also, there is no clarity on whether the facility will be extended to credit cards of other card networks, such as Visa, Mastercard, American Express, etc.”

“The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) will adopt a graded approach to introduce the blockchain-based Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDC). It is planning a step-by-step approach – right from proof of concepts to pilots – before launching the digital currency. The central bank has been exploring the pros and cons of introducing the digital currency in India, ever since it was announced in the Union Budget.     Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, during her Budget speech, said the digital currency would be introduced by 2023.”

According to information provided by the National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI), 5.58 billion transactions were processed using the Unified Payments Interface (UPI) in April 2022. This is the most extensive number of UPI transactions in a single month since the system was launched in 2016.  Last month, the payments network saw transactions worth Rs. 9.83 lakh crore.

“India’s digital payments space has seen a massive boom over the past few years, a growth that’s been supported by an expanding e-commerce marketplace and the wider availability of acceptance infrastructure at physical stores. Building on the rise in digital payment adoption induced by COVID-19 and growing collaborations between fintechs and traditional financial services providers, the payments industry will continue to evolve rapidly over the next two years with more developments expected to take place in areas including contactless payments, the Internet-of-Things (IoT) payments, artificial intelligence/machine learning (AI/ML), and distributed ledger technology (DLT).”

“In the world of digitisation, many FinTech companies have altered the digital payment space in India. Whether it is on-the-spot payments through UPI or quick grocery delivery, almost everything in our daily lives has been digitised. But with only 28% of rural Indians owning internet-enabled smartphones and a poor level of digital literacy, the country’s rural heartland is missing out on the country’s FinTech revolution. While young urban customers are familiar with digital wallets and how to use them effectively, the underbanked sector still requires assistance to navigate the world of digital banking services.”

“India’s central bank is in initial consultations on a rupee-rouble trade arrangement with Moscow that would enable exports to Russia to continue after western sanctions restricted international payment mechanisms. The talks, which would allow India to continue to buy Russian energy exports and other goods, risks angering Washington and its allies as they seek to punish Moscow for its war on Ukraine.”

“MoneyGram International, Inc. , a global leader in the evolution of digital P2P payments, today announced a milestone in the digitization of its global receive network with a new partnership with Paytm Payments Bank , India’s leading payments bank and a driver of financial inclusion in the country. Through this partnership, MoneyGram customers around the globe can send money in near real-time directly to the millions of fully KYC compliant Paytm Wallets in India.”

“Aiming to promote digital transactions and incentivise users having Rupay debit cards and BHIM unified payments interface (UPI) system, the union cabinet on Wednesday approved reimbursement of ₹ 1,300 crore on such transactions. Elaborating about the cabinet’s decision, minister for electronics and IT Ashwini Vaishnaw told media persons that the government will reimburse transaction charges levied on digital payments made by persons to the merchant as part of the merchant discount rate (MDR).”

“WhatsApp (FB.O) has won regulatory approval to double the number of users on its payments service in India to 40 million, a source with direct knowledge told Reuters on Friday. The company had requested that there should be no cap on users of its payment service in India. Instead, the National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) this week told the company it could double the user base to which it can offer its payment service – currently restricted to 20 million – the source said.”

“PhonePe, India’s leading digital payments platform today announced that it has processed over 2 Billion transactions on its platform in Oct’21. PhonePe is the market leader in UPI transactions, driving the highest number of P2P and merchant transactions in the country. It also has the pole position in Recharge and Bill Payment transactions via BBPS. PhonePe had crossed the 1 Billion monthly transaction mark in February this year, and has now hit the 2 billion milestone in just 8 months, cementing its position as India’s leading Fintech platform.”

“Google Pay is one of the most frequently used payment services in India, where it’s the go-to app for UPI payments. Today, at the Google for India 2021 event, the search giant announced a couple of new features that will make the app even better. The bill split feature was first tested in Singapore before being rolled out in the US at the end of 2020. It’s going to come to India later this year, which will be super handy when a group of friends or family members go out to a restaurant or a movie and need to split up the expenses among them. It will send the request to group members and also track the payments for you. It will also help you avoid sending reminders to your friends on WhatsApp as Google Pay can take care of that.”

“India’s buy-now-pay-later (BNPL) industry is booming and set to surge over ten-fold within four years as tens of millions of online shoppers get lured by interest-free credit with fewer hassles, market players told Reuters. Redseer estimates India’s BNPL market will rocket to $45-50 billion by 2026 from $3-3.5 billion now. The research firm also estimates that the number of BNPL users in the country may rise to 80-100 million customers by then, from 10-15 million currently.”

“dLocal, a technology-first payments platform that enables global enterprise merchants to connect with billions of consumers in emerging markets, announces today the launch of a new auto-debit payment solution for subscription business model companies in India. The solution is now available to both local and international merchants and is fully compliant with the new Reserve Bank of India (RBI) guidelines.”

“This was a 56% jump from ₹6.54 lakh crore worth transactions in September Amidst festival season sales and opening up of the economy, UPI transactions touched a record high at ₹7.71 lakh crore in value terms in October. This was a new record for UPI, which is fast becoming the most popular choice for digital payments. It was a 56 per cent jump from ₹6.54 lakh crore in transaction value recorded in September.”

“Indian consumers are ratcheting up buy-now-pay-later installment plans to purchase everything from washing machines to vacations online as the country’s longest festive season gets underway. Popularity is swelling for these small-sized loans that typically amount to less than 5,000 rupees ($67) as the labor market recovers from the pandemic shock. Those payments have been growing at least 20%-30% over the past three months, according to fintech-firm executives. They are expected to increase by about 66% on an annual basis in India to $11.6 billion this year, a survey by Research and Markets showed.”

“From October 1 onwards, all kinds of recurring or repetitive payments, especially made through credit and debit cards and which are of value of ₹ 5,000 and above, are being preceded by a notification, 24 hours in advance, informing the customer about the scheduled payment. The advanced notification for executing recurring payments to customers being sent by banks is meant for seeking the latter’s approval for taking forward any such transaction, as per the new norms notified by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI).”

“Paytm, a pioneer in mobile payments in India and one of the country’s best-known startups, set out years ago to build an ubiquitous digital-finance ecosystem much like Ant Group Co.’s Alipay in China. Now, as Paytm’s owner nears a $2.2 billion listing that will see it beat Ant to the public markets , the company isn’t the dominant player it wanted to become and faces mounting challenges in an increasingly crowded Indian payments market. It has already been overtaken in one key area by deep-pocketed rivals including Alphabet Inc.’s Google and Walmart Inc. -backed Indian startup PhonePe.”