India’s Money View is in talks to raise another round of funding against a unicorn valuation, two sources familiar with the matter told londonbusinessblog.com, as a boost to the local fintech community that has been rocked in recent years by the harsh guidelines and central bank financing crisis. months.
Apis Partners is considering leading a funding round of about $125 million to $150 million in the Bengaluru-headquartered startup with a valuation of about $1 billion, the sources said. The round, a Series E, has not yet been finalized, so the terms of the deal may still change, the sources warned and asked for anonymity when speaking about non-public information.
Apis Partners, Money View and the founders of the startup did not respond to a request for comment Wednesday evening local time.
The eight-year-old startup, which was valued at $615 million in a Series D funding round in March this year, offers loans to individuals who can’t get credit from banks and other financial institutions. The startup has said in the past that the majority of its clients live in small Indian towns and villages.
“India is one of the most disadvantaged major economies when it comes to access to credit. More than 70% of the credit provided by banks is given only to the top 10% of wealthy Indians,” it describes on its website.
“The most underprivileged segments are those earning less than 5L [$6,070] a year. Money View aims to bridge this credit gap by providing personalized loan offers to its clients through its robust data and risk assessment model. The company’s proprietary data models provide a 360-degree risk assessment, enabling credit for the underserved segments.”
Money View – which counts Ribbit Capital, Tiger Global and Accel among its existing backers – has been profitable for more than a year, founder Puneet Agarwal said in a press statement in May, and was well on its way to achieving an annualized revenue ratio of about 80 million. dollars.
“In the age of companies burning money, we are one of the few fintech startups that have been profitable for over a year now,” Agarwal said in a press release in May.
The new financing deliberations come at a time when deal flow activity in the South Asian market has slowed dramatically as investors become more cautious about writing new checks and evaluating their underwriting models after valuations of publicly traded companies fall.
Indian startups raised $3 billion in the quarter ended September, down 57% from the previous quarter and 80% year-over-year, according to market intelligence platform Tracxn.