Paytm Gets RBI Nod to Expand Payments Into Offline and Cross-Border Flows

What Did the RBI Approve?

Paytm has received approval from the Reserve Bank of India to extend its payment aggregator licence to cover offline and cross-border transactions, widening the scope of services it can offer to merchants. The clearance applies to Paytm Payments Services Ltd, a wholly owned unit of One 97 Communications, and builds on the online payment aggregator licence granted in November 2025 under the Payment and Settlement Systems Act.

With the latest authorisation, Paytm can now operate across online, in-store, and international payment flows. That allows the company to offer payment acceptance and settlement services for a broad set of merchant use cases, including physical retail payments, digital commerce, and international collections involving both inward and outward flows.

The approval places Paytm among a small group of payment firms in India with regulatory clearance across all major payment aggregation categories, at a time when compliance expectations around governance, merchant onboarding, and cross-border controls remain tight.

Investor Takeaway

Why Does This Mark the End of a Long Regulatory Process?

Payment aggregators play a central role in India’s financial system, sitting between consumers, merchants, banks, and card or UPI networks. Because of that position, the RBI applies strict standards around risk controls, data security, governance, and , especially for cross-border transactions that involve foreign platform and overseas counterparties.

Paytm’s application to operate as a payment aggregator had been under regulatory review for several years, following broader scrutiny of its payments and banking-linked operations. The November 2025 approval for online aggregation was widely viewn as the first clear sign that regulators were satisfied with changes to its and operational structure.

The newly granted permission for offline and cross-border payments completes that process. It confirms that the regulator is comfortable with Paytm’s controls across physical merchant acceptance and international flows, areas that carry higher operational and compliance risk than domestic online payments.

How Does the Expanded Licence Change Paytm’s Merchant Offering?

Offline aggregation is particularly relevant in India, where a large share of merchant transactions still take place in physical stores, small shops, and service outlets. With the expanded licence, Paytm can support in-store acceptance more comprehensively, tying together QR-based payments, card transactions, and settlement services under a single regulatory umbrella.

Cross-border authorisation extends that reach to merchants involved in exports, international services, tourism, and global e-commerce. The approval allows Paytm to process both incoming and outgoing international payments, giving Indian businesses a regulated channel for collecting from overseas customers or paying foreign partners.

This broader capability moves Paytm closer to offering end-to-end merchant infrastructure rather than point answers, allowing it to compete more directly with other large multiple transaction types.

Investor Takeaway

What Else Is Paytm Doing to Rebuild Trust?

Alongside regulatory progress, Paytm has rolled out product changes focused on user privacy and control. One recent addition is an in-app feature called “Hide Payments,” which allows users to move selected UPI transactions out of their main transaction history. Access to hidden entries requires PIN or biometric verification.

The sensitivity around transaction visibility, especially among users who share devices or accounts. It also reflects a broader shift in India’s digital payments market, where privacy and data handling are becoming as significant to users as speed and convenience.

On the technology side, Paytm has partnered with Groq to deploy real-time artificial intelligence across parts of its payments infrastructure. The focus is on backend systems such as fraud detection, transaction monitoring, and operational efficiency rather than consumer-facing tools. These systems are particularly relevant for scaling cross-border payments, where automated risk checks are critical.

What Does This Mean for Paytm’s Position in India’s Payments Market?

The expanded licence places Paytm on firmer regulatory ground relative to peers and removes a major overhang that has followed the company since its public listing. It also restores its ability to compete across the full payments stack, from online commerce to physical retail and international transactions.

More broadly, the approval reflects the regulator’s assessment that Paytm’s governance structure and compliance controls now meet the standards expected of systemically significant payment intermediaries. As India continues to push digital deeper into everyday commerce and expand international payment links, firms with full regulatory clearance are likely to play a larger role.

For Paytm, the clearance does not guarantee growth, but it removes structural limits that have constrained its payments business. How effectively the company converts that regulatory access into merchant adoption and transaction volume will be the next test.