India has ranked third among the countries with the most financial technology (fintech) unicorns in the world in 2023, with the US and UK retaining the top two positions globally. While US is home to 134 unicorns and produces the most value in terms of fintech, UK took second place with 27 fintech unicorns and India secured the third position with 17 fintech unicorns in 2023 so far.
According to global research firm Statista, US is also home to the largest fintech companies worldwide by market capitalisation, with fintech majors Visa, Paypal, and Mastercard dominating the global ecosystem. Out of the top 15 highest-valued fintech firms globally, eight are from the US.
The combined valuation of these eight unicorns – which include Visa ($465.13 billion) and MasterCard ($344.57 billion) – comes in at $1.2 trillion. China came second, despite being home to only eight unicorns. These include giants such as Tencent ($187.92 billion) and Ant Financial ($151 billion), taking the country's overall financial market cap to $338.92 billion.
The Silicon Valley is a natural home for the sector given its history in producing some of the world’s largest technology companies, such as Meta, Apple, Google, and Amazon, and a well-established venture capital system with players such as Sequoia Capital and Andreessen Horowitz.
India's top profitable companies include stock brokerage platform Zerodha, fintech firm Billdesk, UPI giant Paytm, etc. FinTech giants like Zerodha, Razorpay, Pine Labs, Paytm, Billdesk, among few others have been profitable.
Paytm recorded a consolidate revenue from operations of ₹2,519 crore in the second quarter of fiscal year 2023-24 (Q2FY24), marking a growth of 32 percent as compared to ₹1,914 crore reported in the year-ago period.
The fintech major posted a consolidated net loss of ₹292 crore during the quarter under review, which is 49 per cent lower as against a loss of ₹572 crore reported in the corresponding period of FY23.
In the UK, some of the biggest unicorns include online banking startup Revolut ($33 billion) crypto wallet provider Blockchain.com ($14 billion), and digital payments groups Checkout.com ($11 billion), Rapyd ($8.75 billion) and SumUp ($8.5 billion), according to Statista.
In the UK, startups such as Monzo and Starling made a mark in the banking world with their digital-only offerings, while in China, Alibaba and Tencent launched their own respective mobile wallets, Alipay and WeChat Pay.
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