SUMMARY
It claims to offer the highest interests on FDs in the industry, i.e 7% p.a.
The company crossed INR 1K Cr in deposits last month
Paytm digital payments business is likely to be hit with decline in digital transactions
After crossing the milestone of INR 1K Cr deposits with 57 Mn saving accounts last month, Paytm Payments Bank has now crossed over INR 600 Cr in fixed deposit (FD) accounts, which were held in partnership with Induslnd Bank.
The payments bank, in a release, highlighted that a sizable number of customers are moving their savings into fixed deposits during the ongoing lockdown. It elaborated that Paytm Payments Bank allowed customers to earn up to 7% interest on their fixed deposits, which is the highest in the industry.
The company added that customers can instantly redeem the partial or complete amount from the fixed deposit at any time, free of charge.
Satish Kumar Gupta, CEO and managing director at Paytm Payments Bank, said, “Our efforts are aligned with our mission of bringing financial inclusion in our country. We believe that wealth management products should be available to all, irrespective of their quantum of wealth.”
Paytm Payments Bank, which claims to be the only profitable payments bank in India, had added direct benefit transfer (DBT) support for government subsidies, last month, without any extra charges for linking accounts to receive government subsidies. Besides this, account holders can also keep a check on the status of the transfers through the app.
Paytm Payments Bank was founded in 2017 and is the first profitable arm of Vijay Shekhar Sharma-led One 97 Communications. The company turned profitable in 2019, registering INR 19 Cr in profits compared to INR 51.42 Cr loss it had incurred in the previous year.
The RBI has licenced 11 payments banks, but only seven have started their operations in India. Besides Paytm Payments Bank, these include Airtel Payments Bank, India Post Payments Bank, Fino Payments Bank, Jio Payments Bank, NSDL Payments Bank and Aditya Birla Payments Bank.
While Paytm Payments Bank has been crossing one milestone after another, the digital payments segment of One 97 Communications, Paytm, has been suffering with the fall of digital payments in India.
In April 2020, the Unified Payments Interface (UPI) transactions fell below the billion mark with 990 Mn transactions worth INR 1.51 Lakh Cr. This was the lowest number of transactions UPI had recorded since October 2019.
UPI transactions had noted its first decline in 12 months in March 2020 with 1.25 Bn transactions worth INR 2.06 Lakh Cr, against 1.33 Mn transactions worth INR 2.22 Lakh Cr noted in February.
Meanwhile, payment gateway Razorpay’s digital transaction report for April noted that transactions through UPI, cards and net banking declined by 37%, 30%, and 28% respectively.
Amidst these developments, WhatsApp’s digital payments platform is also preparing for its launch this month making the market more competitive. Currently, the digital payments segment is dominated by Google Pay, PhonePe and Paytm.
