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It was a busy month for India’s fintech ecosystem. On the public markets, SEBI issued final observations on the proposed IPO of Social Worth Technologies, the parent company of lending tech startup Fibe (formerly EarlySalary), while digital lending unicorn Moneyview completed its stock market debut. Meanwhile, Zerodha received the regulator’s nod to operate as a merchant banker, and Upstox launched US stock investing on its platform. Beyond these developments, two themes dominated the fintech conversation in September: the growing use of AI in payments and the changing economics of fintech businesses. With a flurry of AI-centric products, the Global Fintech Fest 2026 (GFF) in Mumbai was a major showcase this month. BharatPe launched an agentic AI platform for merchants, Pine Labs unveiled an agent-led commerce feature on L&T Finance’s PLANET app, while several banks and NBFCs partnered with new-age startups to bring AI capabilities to their platforms. While UPI operator NPCI also launched enterprise-focused AI tools, its expected launch of a framework for agentic payments on UPI did not materialise. Meanwhile, the rapid advancement of AI has raised concerns about the potential risks that frontier models could pose to the security and stability of the financial system. At GFF, Prime Minister Narendra Modi and RBI Governor Sanjay Malhotra both stressed the need for fintech companies to strengthen consumer trust. NPCI MD and CEO Dilip Asbe also said banks and payments companies would need to invest in AI to combat cyber threats, while explaining the rationale behind introducing merchant discount rate (MDR) charges on UPI. This brings us to the second major theme of the month: fintech economics. After months of speculation, the new UPI MDR regime has finally been notified. From October 15, UPI payments above ₹2,000 will attract a 0.4% fee, with exemptions for smaller merchants, critical sectors and peer-to-peer (P2P) transfers. The new framework has sparked a debate over who will ultimately bear the cost and whether, or to what extent, it could be passed on to consumers. The insurance sector is facing a similar inflexion point. The Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority of India (IRDAI) has proposed bringing back product- and channel-specific commission caps for insurance distributors. The move could directly affect commission-dependent listed insurtech companies like PB Fintech and Turtlemint. The common thread running through these developments is the challenge of balancing consumer protection with the commercial interests of fintech and financial services companies. Against this backdrop, we are back with the sixth edition of the “Five Fintech Startups To Watch”. This monthly series spotlights startups operating in some of the most promising and fast-evolving segments of India’s fintech ecosystem. With that said, here are some of the interesting ventures that caught our attention in September. Editor’s Note: The list below is not a ranking of any kind. Startups have been listed alphabetically. 72 Street | AI-Powered Investment Advisory As India’s capital markets broaden and deepen, retail investors often struggle to make sense of the language of the markets. A savvy investor today has to sift through multiple sources, decode technical information and turn it into actionable insights. Mumbai-based 72 Street is looking to shorten this learning curve, particularly for Gen Z and first-time investors. The wealthtech startup is building a research-led investment platform for retail investors, combining stock screening with human analyst oversight to make market research easier to understand and act on. Founded in 2025 by Rohit Agarwal and Fal Ghancha, 72 Street has raised ₹4 Cr from angel investors and ultra-high-net-worth individuals (UHNIs) to date as it seeks a slice of India’s booming investment tech market, which now exceeds $14 Bn. The startup’s platform has two key components: the 72 Street app and its AI researcher, Venty. The app offers research-backed stock ideas, live market data, watchlists and investment tools, bringing a range of market information onto a single platform. Venty, meanwhile, helps users make sense of this data. The AI researcher analyses more than 3,800 NSE- and BSE-listed stocks across fundamental, technical and sentiment indicators. It also detects chart patterns to generate AI-powered insights, which SEBI-registered research analysts then review before presenting them to users. Cruise Money | Agentic AI Assistant For Your Wealth Managing personal finances across multiple accounts and investment products can be overwhelming. Figuring out how to deploy your money to meet specific goals, how much to save, where to invest and how much to spend can be just as complicated. Cruise Money is looking to simplify this using AI agents that aggregate financial data, decode spending patterns and offer actionable advice. Founded by Vinay Bharathwaj, Ganesh KV and Vikrant Mudaliar in 2025, Cruise Money operates in India’s robo-advisory market, which is projected to reach $7 Bn by 2034.. Its app brings together users’ financial information, including mutual fund holdings and cash flows, and uses chat to help them understand their spending, savings and investment goals. On the regulatory front, Cruise accesses users’ accounts through the RBI’s Account Aggregator framework on a read-only basis and provides investment guidance under the SEBI-registered Investment Adviser framework. The startup plans to launch its first agentic card around Diwali 2026. Users can describe a purchase or financial goal to the chatbot, after which the AI-powered platform will suggest ways to achieve it based on their financial profile. For instance, someone looking to buy a new smartphone could receive a recommendation for an EMI plan suited to their spending capacity. Users can then complete the transaction directly through the platform. Cruise’s USP is proactively guiding users based on their financial priorities. Its AI agents can nudge users to increase their savings to stay on track for retirement goals or recommend direct mutual fund plans instead of regular plans. Drona Pay | Helping Banks And Insurers Combat Fraud As technology advances, financial fraud and money laundering are becoming not just more frequent, but more sophisticated. Financial institutions need to identify suspicious accounts and transactions faster while keeping false positives to a minimum, so legitimate customers are not unnecessarily flagged. With India’s fraud detection and prevention market growing rapidly at over 20% CAGR to cross $7.2 Bn by 2033, Drona Pay is seeking to help financial institutions detect risk earlier and respond faster. Founded in 2021 by Satish Kashyap, Pallavi Narvekar and Sukhdev Sinh Zala, Drona Pay is building risk and compliance software for banks, fintechs, payment processors and insurers. The platform analyses transactions and user behaviour in real time using machine learning, alternative data and behavioural biometrics. Signals such as device information, IP addresses, location and keystroke patterns can help identify account takeovers, mule accounts, social engineering scams, merchant fraud and suspicious lending activity. Its product suite includes transaction monitoring, anti-money laundering and counter-terrorist financing tools, case management, data integration, early-warning alerts and decisioning for offers, delinquency and insurance claims. The company’s analytics platform also combines banking, lending and card data to build customer profiles and help financial institutions assess risk. LendingIQ | Automating Lending Workflows Founded by Ashish Kaushik, Ankit Singh and Sai Koundinya in 2025, LendingIQ builds and operates AI agents for banks, fintechs and NBFCs. The startup operates in the market for AI in lending, which was pegged at $835 Mn in 2024 and projected to grow at over 36% to reach $5.4 Bn by 2029. It targets a common challenge in credit operations: manually extracting information, chasing missing documents, and interpreting lending policies. Together, these slow down decisions and create inconsistencies in assessments. LendingIQ’s AI agents support functions across loan origination, underwriting, collections and servicing. They can also continuously update their workflows to stay aligned with a lender’s rulebook as policies change. The platform first connects with a lender’s existing systems and audits its processes to identify areas where AI agents could deliver the highest return on investment. It then tests the agents on a sandboxed sample of the lender’s data to validate their performance before deployment. Once deployed, the agents integrate into existing workflows, with LendingIQ monitoring metrics such as accuracy, latency, exceptions, and policy changes to ensure they continue to perform as expected. LendingIQ primarily serves lenders across retail and SME lending, home loans, gold loans, auto finance and commercial lending. The startup works with clients across India, the US, Europe, the Middle East, Southeast Asia, Australia and New Zealand. It claims that most clients see measurable results within two weeks of deploying their first AI agent. WeCredit | Transforming Traditional Borrowing Landscape Founded by Mukul Devpura and Laksh Dua in 2022, WeCredit is a digital credit marketplace that helps individuals and small businesses compare loan products from multiple lenders. The startup is targeting the fragmented $491 Bn Indian lending market. It aims to help borrowers navigate different providers to find suitable products, compare terms and understand their options. WeCredit lists personal, business, car, home and gold loans from more than 25 lending partners, including Moneyview, KreditBee, L&T Finance and Olyv. Users can compare offers and apply for loans through the platform, although interest rates, eligibility, approval and disbursal remain subject to individual lenders’ criteria and verification processes. The startup also offers personal loan and EMI calculators, along with free credit-score and credit-report checks powered by Equifax. By bringing multiple lenders onto a single platform, WeCredit aims to reduce the time borrowers spend searching for loans and help them compare options before applying. The platform also says this can reduce the need for borrowers to make multiple applications and, in turn, limit hard credit enquiries that could affect their credit scores. According to its website, WeCredit has more than 5 Lakh users and has facilitated over ₹2,500 Cr in loan disbursals since inception. Edited by Shishir Parasher With inputs from Akshit Pushkarna Creative by Abhyam Gusai
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