Author: Srinidhi Chari
Profile: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ca-srinidhichari/
India will never have a Nubank. Or a Revolut.
Not because we lack the talent or the demand. Because the RBI doesn't let a digital-only bank exist the way Brazil or the UK do.
I've spent the last few weeks going back through the licensing on-ramps every neobank in India has actually tried. The picture is stark. ⤵️
→ Jupiter has raised $200M+, built one of the slickest apps in Indian fintech, and still isn't a bank. It runs entirely on partner licenses - Federal Bank holds the deposits, NBFCs hold the loans. Jupiter holds the UX.
→ slice took the harder road - merged into an actual Small Finance Bank to get a real license. The price of that license: mandatory listing and a loan book that has to be majorly secured.
A company built on unsecured, underwriting-led lending to young India now has a regulatory clock forcing it toward secured, asset-backed lending. That's a different business.
And once you clear all of that, the market still doesn't price you on the app, the UX, or the distribution. It prices you on book - loans, deposits, NIMs. Same metrics as the 200-year-old bank next door.
Slice is doing the acquisition and product work as very well. That was never going to be the hard part.
The hard part is what happened to everyone else. Indian neobanks raised close to $1 billion between 2018 and 2023 - most of it in the 2021 wave, when every VC in the room wanted their own Nubank bet. Jupiter alone has raised $200 million+ chasing that thesis and has spent years actually trying to get a banking license of its own. It still doesn't have one.
So here's the question I'd actually put to the regulator: if a company can raise nine figures, build real distribution, and still not clear the licensing bar after half a decade of trying - is a distressed SFB merger the only door left standing? And if it is, what was that entire 2021 funding wave actually betting on?
#india #fintech #venturecapital
Not because we lack the talent or the demand. Because the RBI doesn't let a digital-only bank exist the way Brazil or the UK do.
I've spent the last few weeks going back through the licensing on-ramps every neobank in India has actually tried. The picture is stark. ⤵️
→ Jupiter has raised $200M+, built one of the slickest apps in Indian fintech, and still isn't a bank. It runs entirely on partner licenses - Federal Bank holds the deposits, NBFCs hold the loans. Jupiter holds the UX.
→ slice took the harder road - merged into an actual Small Finance Bank to get a real license. The price of that license: mandatory listing and a loan book that has to be majorly secured.
A company built on unsecured, underwriting-led lending to young India now has a regulatory clock forcing it toward secured, asset-backed lending. That's a different business.
And once you clear all of that, the market still doesn't price you on the app, the UX, or the distribution. It prices you on book - loans, deposits, NIMs. Same metrics as the 200-year-old bank next door.
Slice is doing the acquisition and product work as very well. That was never going to be the hard part.
The hard part is what happened to everyone else. Indian neobanks raised close to $1 billion between 2018 and 2023 - most of it in the 2021 wave, when every VC in the room wanted their own Nubank bet. Jupiter alone has raised $200 million+ chasing that thesis and has spent years actually trying to get a banking license of its own. It still doesn't have one.
So here's the question I'd actually put to the regulator: if a company can raise nine figures, build real distribution, and still not clear the licensing bar after half a decade of trying - is a distressed SFB merger the only door left standing? And if it is, what was that entire 2021 funding wave actually betting on?
#india #fintech #venturecapital