Union Budget 2026: What India’s Fintech sector wants from the next wave of reforms

As India’s fintech ecosystem matures from rapid experimentation to large-scale adoption, expectations from Union Budget 2026 are firmly focused on regulatory clarity, digital infrastructure, and capital efficiency. With fintechs now powering everything from payments and lending to wealth tech and embedded finance, industry leaders are looking to the government for policy continuity, tax rationalization, and stronger support for innovation-led growth, especially as global funding tightens and profitability takes center stage.

Read more: From scale to substance: How Fintech shaped 2025 & what 2026 holds next

The Tech Panda asked Fintech industry players what their expectations are from the Union Budget 2026.

Seema Prem, Co-founder & CEO, FIA Global

“Public spending could complement private AI investment to increase rural banking productivity. Budgetary support through grants, co-investment funds, or guarantees can accelerate adoption of AI for vernacular interfaces, fraud detection, and alternative credit models for financial services’ delivery in rural areas.

“To accelerate AI’s reach in Bharat, the Budget could provide for funding shared intelligence, not isolated pilots—AI that makes the Bank Mitra channel cheaper to run, safer to trust, and easier for customers to use. This requires targeted public investment in common AI rails such as vernacular voice interfaces, real-time fraud and grievance intelligence, and alternative credit and cash-flow models tailored for rural livelihoods.

“The Budget could empower NABARD to support the Bank Mitra ecosystem with AI adoption, shared data platforms, and partnerships with cooperative banks, Regional Rural Banks, and State Rural Livelihood Missions.”

SB Seker, Head of APAC, Binance

“India’s rapid adoption of blockchain and virtual digital assets (VDA) reflects both the scale of its digital economy and growing participation by retail users. The forthcoming budget presents an opportunity to strengthen the VDA ecosystem through measured regulatory and tax refinements that protect users, maintain financial stability, and support responsible market development.

“From a tax perspective, a pragmatic framework focused on capital gains realised, with provisions for limited loss set off and removal on transaction level levies in favour of net-revenue generating corporate taxes instead, can improve fairness for retail participants and indicate to them India has moved past the tax-and-deter regime towards a fuller license-and-supervise one.

“Clear, consistent operating standards for VDA platforms, aligned with India’s AML/KYC and investor protection priorities, will encourage responsible capital investment, create skilled jobs, and build domestic capabilities.

“India’s approach to blockchain governance, combined with its strong digital public infrastructure, provides a solid foundation to integrate innovation with transparency, financial inclusion, and economic growth objectives. A balanced regulatory environment that safeguards users, supports innovation, and ensures predictable taxation will help India convert high participation into durable economic value and reinforce its position as a leading fintech hub.”

Dilip Modi, Founder & CEO, Spice Money

“As India accelerates its financial inclusion journey, the Union Budget should continue to prioritise the non-bank Business Correspondents ecosystem and rural fintechs that enable last-mile access to essential banking services. BCs are the backbone of assisted digital finance in Bharat, delivering critical services such as mATM transactions, AePS, cash-in and cash-out, and CASA access in regions where physical bank branches remain limited. Strengthening this network through better infrastructure support, digital enablement, and sustainable incentive structures will significantly deepen formal banking penetration. Rural fintechs have played a pivotal role in making everyday banking accessible and reliable for underserved communities. Enhanced connectivity in rural areas, and adoption of vernacular and voice-based interfaces can further drive usage and trust among first-time users.

“As fintech participation in core banking and payment services grows, there is also a need for clearer regulatory guidelines focused on operational transparency, standardised reporting, and consumer protection. Consistent disclosure norms, improved grievance redressal frameworks, and clear compliance expectations will help strengthen confidence across the ecosystem. A budget that balances inclusion, innovation, and governance will ensure that assisted digital finance continues to empower citizens while supporting sustainable growth in India’s rural economy.”

Matías Gainza Eurnekian, CEO, Federal Card Services

“Sharing his anticipation for the Union Budget 2026-27 and its potential impact on the industry, Matías Gainza Eurnekian, CEO, Federal Card Services (FCS), said “India’s payments landscape is entering its next phase of expansion, supported by rising consumer incomes, growing spending power, and rapid digital adoption. Industry insights from PwC and Visa consistently show that as disposable incomes increase, the use of cards and digital payment methods also accelerates especially when backed by strong acceptance infrastructure, financial inclusion initiatives and innovative payment offerings.

“In this context, the upcoming Union Budget presents an important opportunity to strengthen the foundations of the ecosystem. Targeted incentives for advanced manufacturing and a continued push toward local production can help build a more resilient, globally competitive payments value chain. Extending and modernising schemes such as the Production Linked Incentive (PLI), particularly for next-generation technologies, would further support this momentum.

“Equally critical is policy clarity that balances growth with fiscal discipline. When consumers and businesses have confidence in the macroeconomic environment, it directly supports the adoption of new payment technologies and enables the digital payments sector to scale in a sustainable, long-term manner.”

Srikrishna Narasimhan, Whole-Time Director & CEO, GlobalPay

“India’s cross-border and forex payments landscape is seeing strong momentum, led by students pursuing education overseas, followed by Indian businesses expanding globally and rising outbound leisure travel. The Union Budget offers a timely opportunity to address the distinct needs of these segments through targeted regulatory and infrastructure measures.

“While education remittances funded through loans are already exempt from TCS, extending a similar exemption to education-related payments made from a student’s own funds would recognise these as essential, non-discretionary expenses.

“The increasing reliance on exclusive or semi-closed education payment platforms linked to specific universities raises concerns around fee opacity, pricing power, and limited consumer choice. Ensuring open access and fee neutrality in education remittances is therefore critical.

“There is also a need to introduce enforceable safeguards aligned to product positioning and end-use. Where payment instruments are marketed for international education or travel, mandatory submission of relevant documentation should apply at onboarding or usage. Further, explicit purpose tagging across all cross-border instruments, mapped to FEMA categories, will enable regulatory harmonisation based on use case rather than instrument type. Such harmonisation will strengthen reporting integrity, curb misclassification, and support genuine student and traveller needs.

“As outbound leisure travel grows, consistent policies and investments in interoperable cross-border infrastructure will be key to delivering transparent and affordable forex solutions and positioning India as a credible global payments hub.”

Mannuri Vamshi Krishna, Founder & CEO, SafeCredits

“The Union Budget 2026–27 offers a timely opportunity to strengthen India’s enterprise and MSME ecosystem by advancing digital credit governance, risk transparency, and ease of doing business. For large corporates and fast-growing SMEs, managing credit across complex distributor and dealer networks remains a key challenge that directly impacts cash flows, compliance, and operational efficiency. The Budget should encourage wider adoption of AI-driven risk management and RegTech platforms through targeted incentives, expanded support for Digital Public Infrastructure, and continued backing for SaaS and deep-tech innovation. Policy measures that promote paperless onboarding, automated KYC, real-time payment monitoring, and seamless ERP-integrated fintech solutions will significantly reduce friction, defaults, and turnaround times. At SafeCredits, we believe a forward-looking policy framework can shift enterprises from manual, reactive credit control to predictive, data-led decision-making, enabling faster collections, stronger governance, and transparent, scalable B2B ecosystems.”

Shaan Patel, Founder & Chief Investment Officer, Shaan Patel Asset Management (SPAM)

“As we approach the Union Budget 2026, India’s AIF industry has shown exceptional resilience and growth in 2025, with commitments crossing ?15 trillion in late 2025. We expect measures to create a level playing field, particularly tax rationalization by aligning Category III taxation with mutual funds, including pass-through status or reduced slab-based burdens. Such changes would remove uncertainties, boost investor confidence, and channel more capital into flexible strategies like our Flexi Cap Fund. Combined with SEBI’s recent simplifications, this could accelerate industry growth, support innovation and job creation, and strengthen India’s position as a global investment destination.”

Vinay Bagri, CEO & Co-Founder, Niyo

“As Indians spend more money beyond borders for travel, education and work, we believe the focus in Budget 2026 should shift from just transaction limits to spending efficiency. While LRS limits often dominate the conversation, the bigger issue for consumers is the silent cost of foreign exchange markups that inflate overseas expenses. Simplifying international payment processes, reducing TCS on legitimate foreign transactions, and continuing to encourage digital banking innovation will go a long way in making global spending more transparent and accessible. A stable policy environment and close collaboration between regulators and fintechs can help empower Indian travellers and support responsible growth across the cross-border fintech ecosystem.”

CRYPTO

Abhay Agarwal, Founder, Getbit

“India currently has over 100 million crypto users, making it the fastest growing user base in the world. This growing user base, combined with increased regulation and policy clarity around crypto, has produced an active digital asset economy that is already growing faster than other countries around the world. As such, there are many positive indicators that the crypto space will continue to grow in India.

“We expect the government to provide additional leadership on the regulatory side of the crypto industry with respect to the upcoming 2026 budget. Specifically, we are looking forward to a dedicated Crypto Bill as well as alignment of SEBI guidelines for companies that hold BTC on their balance sheets. In addition, we would expect some type of reasonable tax rationalization under an appropriate regulatory framework for crypto. We also see a very positive economic impact of revisiting the implementation of the 1% TDS alongside the 30% capital gains tax, more specifically to allow for increased liquidity, continued innovation, and to allow for continued oversight of the space – implementing these changes would position India as a world leader in the compliant crypto finance space.

“Implementing these types of changes would keep capital in India, allow for rapid growth of the country’s capabilities in innovation, and give India a great opportunity to take on the role of a thoughtful and responsible leader of the emerging digital asset economy – and create immense wealth for millions of individuals.”