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THE YEAR 2017 IN FINTECH AND THE YEAR AHEAD…

- Abhiram Verma

2017 has been a fantastic year for the Fintech industry in India,Fintech industry is basically
Financial technology is the new technology and innovation that aims to compete with traditional
financial methods in the delivery of financial services spurred on by the positive policy environment
and the increasing penetration and deployment of new technologies. The Fintech industry has
helped make digital payments a day-to-day (eg -bitcoin, paytm etc) a reality in India, hence
developing the most evolved digital payments system among countries including the UK, China,
and Japan, according to a report by FIS(Global), the US-based banking technology provider. The
availability, adoption, and immediacy of payments have helped the value of transactions using
digital wallets rise by 64% from December 2016 to December 2017. These Fintech companies have
also increased the supply of credit to the crucial MSME sector, often financially excluded. Overall,
the Fintech space has driven the Indian economy to a path of a more promising transformation into
being inclusive and data-driven while rapidly driving growth and adding funds to the exchequer
through taxation. While progress has been made, there is still much ground to be covered – India
must up the ante and more aggressively promote these trends to realize its economic potential in
greater measure, and a positive Budget 2018-19 would be the best vehicle to achieve that goal.

The Finance Minister states the following in his Union Budget address:-

* FM proposes a fiscal deficit of 3.3% of GDP for 2018-19.

* Finance Minister Arun Jaitley proposes revising emoluments as per the following
structure:

— Rs 5 lakh for the President of India

— Rs 4 lakh for the Vice President

— Rs 3.5 lakh for the Governors

▪ Jaitley also proposes automatic revision of emoluments of Parliamentarians
every five years, indexed to inflation.

* Target of 3 lakh crore for lending under PM Mudra Yojana: FM.