There are no easy answers to this Charan, in any case our article was about the merit in external credit ratings and not interest rates

Arundhati Ramanathan

I understand the difference you are trying to point out, Prateek, but the broad point we wanted to make was how the government does not have any data on such an important aspect of the economy

Arundhati Ramanathan

Thank you Sumiit, have fixed it.

Arundhati Ramanathan

Thank you Ateesh. I think it is definitely interesting times for payments companies looking to be financial services ones. The strategies of the companies may all look vert different, giving us a ringside view of what is working/not working in a market like India.

Arundhati Ramanathan

Thanks for reading, Prashant. As our in-house investment expert Nithin Sasikumar says, ETFs have a couple of problems - 1. you need a demat account that everyone does not have so it's not as easy to buy an ETF, so the reach is lower. 2. ETFs are still at very nascent stages. So there is no liquidity even for the more popular ones that the EPFO also invests in. For example, when the market crashed during March, on days that the market was negative, some ETFs were positive because of the issues of liquidity. A retail investor will not understand this and end up on the losing side. This is for India in today's environment. Hope this helps?

Arundhati Ramanathan

Thank you Ashok for writing in. You have a point. But it doesn't change the meaning, since they have about Rs 8000 cr in reserves and surplus which is available for use for future use and it is a representation that they have enough funds was our takeaway.

Arundhati Ramanathan

Thanks Ateesh. I'll admit that thought crossed my mind when I looked at it. But the basis for his questions are very valid. That's why I picked up this story. The relationship between RBI and NPCI is not clear even after all thes years. it is not just a legal question, but as the economist pointed out if NPCI can take the role of a state agency where it exercises limiting market share, how many users a company can roll out its service to, etc, that is the work of a regulator. If NPCI is not a regulator but acts like one, the implications for the sector are different. It may seem like a legal quibble, but IMHO, it decides the fate of companies and competitve landscape.

Arundhati Ramanathan

You make some very interesting points, Ajith. Cross subsidisation seems to be a legit business model wrt payments now. The point you make about zero EMI shows the different standards for payments and lending.

Arundhati Ramanathan

Hi Pavan, in the event PayPal acquired BillDesk, it would be for BillDesk's existing relationships with merchants like Amazon was our argument.

Arundhati Ramanathan

Thanks for your PoV, Srikanth. NUE is an interesting development. We don't know who will end up running it, and a lot depends on that IMHO. No doubt, BillDesk and Vasu and his team have the headroom to grow. As a source, I spoke to for the story said, payments is more about evolving than disruption. As for the ageism remark, unless the founders are not in their 50s, not sure what is incorrect. The early 50s remark was to qualify the quote that they have been doing this for 20 years. Was only stating a fact. Nowhere did we insinuate the founders are unfit to run their startups.

Arundhati Ramanathan

Hi Shruti, I didn't compare it to Tally, because it is a product used by chartered accountants and not the merchants themselves in most cases, and it is used by stores that have more turnover than the stores that today use Khatabook.

Arundhati Ramanathan

Thank you Tejasvi, fixed the error.

Arundhati Ramanathan