Finvasia closed a funding deal for an undisclosed amount against a valuation of INR 1.5 Billion from some of the industry's notable Venture Capitalists, where majority FDI stake is from Intrinsic Investment Limited.
The company envisions to create a technologically driven commission free financial ecosystem in India by taking the middleman out of an average investor's portfolio.
Finvasia believes that with the price war is sharpening amongst brokers and there is an increasing need to create a technologically driven ecosystem in the country's financial space. The company is going to launch 12 products over the course of next 24 months to usher the changes that they have envisioned.
To get the ball rolling, it became the country's first Broker that offers Brokerage Free Trading on 15th of August 2016. Finvasia offers "Life-time" commission-free trading in ALL segments on ALL exchanges. The management believes that a broker's vested interests in churning trades to earn commissions topped by various hidden fees often kills existing investors and deters newbies from entering the market. But by eliminating brokerage and introducing artificial intelligence to trading, Finvasia hopes to eliminate the existing brokerage practices that are marring the Indian financial sector. The company is developing products which will revolutionize both the investment industry and the financial sector as a whole. Furthermore, Finvasia is eyeing expansion and is on the course of becoming a Commercial Clearing member with NSE and waiting to become a NBFC and a Depository Participant.
Along with brokerage free trading, Finvasia introduced Instant eKYC that allows investors to open verified trading accounts in fiveminutes and begin trading within 30 minutes. With instant eKYC, a user directly enters his PAN number and Date of Birth on Finvasia website and all his information gets instantly fetched from central KRA. The user then authorises and validates the information provided by supplying the OTP that was sent to his registered phone number.
Thereafter, KYC forms are auto generated and the user electronically signs the entire KYC document using an automated process that links KYC documents to user signatures from Aadhaar card. Finvasia's instant eKYC process is approved by NSE, BSE, MCX and SEBI as a valid KYC process.
Finvasia is trying to redefine what is possible within the FINTECH ecosystem and beyond. This funding is the dawn of major company milestones like:
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Robo Advisory
Finvasia is actively providing various technology based products such as social trading platform in global markets via its associated UK Company. The company now plans to bring the same technology to India. This automated, algorithm-based portfolio management advice will allow Finvasia customers to compare their portfolios and benchmark their performance against the Finvasia community, the markets, and their peers. Robo Advisors will act as a personal digital research assistant to an investor enabling him to manage his portfolio and its risk. Evaluating risk is much easier said than done and an average investor is usually not aware of the potential pit holes in the composition of his portfolio, whether its leverage, lack of diversification or statistically counter intuitive assumptions. This is where Finvasia's Robo Advisors will lay it out a risk management plan in very plain and simple words that can be understood by an average investor. More details shall follow soon.
Open Source Web Trader
Finvasia is planning to launch an open source web trader that traders can manipulate using API's to build platforms that can be completely customised by a trader to fit their needs. This web trader will have widgets and apps, just like the ones on smart phones, so a user can customise his trading to his needs and not be constrained to the "One Size Fit All" type of trading terminals. Additionally, the company will be introducing various Algo based trading technologies for diversified client base.
Other Products
Over last several years, Finvasia has been offering innovative technological solutions to both institutional as well as retail investors in developed countries. They plan on bringing all these technologically innovative products to India, in a phase manner, over next 24 months. From a technological standpoint, the company is ready, but before it introduces any financial product, they need to make sure that they are in compliance with laws of the land. Finvasia is working with financial regulators and oversight agencies to make sure that the products meet the local legal and compliance requirements of India. The company is certain that it will get the same level of response from Indian investors as it had gotten from their counterparts in developed countries.
From the management
"The idea - to the take the middle man out of an investor's portfolio sprouted from an epiphany, when we realized that when it does not cost to send an email or a WhatsApp message, why does it cost to send a trade over to the exchange. All these prompts are nothing more than data packets that travel across a network from source to destination using internet bandwidth. And, sending a trade to the exchange uses the least amount of internet bandwidth when compared with an email or a standard Facebook post. Today, an average individual has to either pay a fixed per trade charge or monthly fees, which is equivalent to paying for sending a WhatsApp message. We believe there's something inherently wrong with that and we're on a path to transform the typical commission based market to a technology supported investment regime," cite co-founders and brothers - Sarvjeet Singh and Natty Virk.
Finvasia is amongst India's fastest growing FinTech Company, offering services ranging from asset management, investment banking, capital market advisory, and currency hedging to retail brokerage services. The company has advised institutional clients on their investments in fourteen countries while also acting as a one-stop shop for Foreign Portfolio Investors (FPI) who seek to make investments in the Indian markets.
Finvasia is run by Ex-Wall St professionals with deep financial expertise, who envisioned to make affordable financial tools accessible to investors. And, the recent foreign funding has enabled the company to achieve its overarching mission to cut the cost that makes trading expensive and offer technology driven financial services to its clients.
Finvasia is registered as a Trading Member of Multi Commodity Exchange of India (MCX Member ID: 55135, SEBI Code: INZ000020537), as a Trading Member of National Stock Exchange of India Limited (NSE Member Code: 14846, NSE (Cash): INB231484636, NSE (F&O): INF231484636, NSE (CD) INE231484636), AMFI ARN: 103331 and as a Trading Member of Bombay Stock Exchange Ltd (BSE Member ID: 4043).
Additionally, the company is registered as a Foreign Institutional Investor (FII) with Securities Exchange Board of India (SEBI FII Membership Code: INCAFD256911) and as an Investment Advisor with Securities and Exchange Commission, USA (Finvasia IARD/CRD Number: 154602 and SEC file number: 801-71707).