In order to facilitate the immediate purchase, sale, and trading of financial assets as digital tokens settled through the central bank's digital currency, RBI governor Sanjay Malhotra announced the launch of a Unified Market Interface, a new market infrastructure conceptualized by the central bank.

Key Highlights

• RBI unveils Unified Market Interface (UMI) to enable instant digital asset trading via CBDC.
• UMI follows UPI and ULI, reflecting RBI’s push toward deeper market digitisation and interoperability.

"The initial pilot's early efforts and outcomes in enhancing market efficiency here are encouraging," Malhotra stated during his remarks at the Global Fintech Fest 2025. According to the governor, India's digital finance ecosystem has reached a turning point, and data integration, digital currency, asset tokenization, artificial intelligence, and cybersecurity will propel the next stage of inclusion.

Unlocking the potential of financial data through the account aggregator framework, which currently serves 160 million accounts and handles about 3.6 billion requests, was the first area of focus, according to Malhotra. He stated that in order to encourage greater interoperability among aggregators, the RBI is developing new standards for data security, consent management, and customer onboarding.

Additionally, he mentioned the Unified Lending Interface, which connects lenders to validated data sources, as a way to close the credit gap in India. 3.2 million loans totaling Rs 1.7 trillion have been approved since its inception. He claimed that the system would assist lenders in making better use of data to assist those with little or no credit history.

The digital rupee, according to Sanjay Malhotra, is a crucial new component of India's digital public infrastructure. Launched in December 2022, the retail e-rupee currently has 7 million users and 19 banks. "Wider adoption is made possible by interoperability with UPI without sacrificing user convenience," he stated. Citing Gujarat's G-Safal scheme, which limits spending to approved farm inputs, and an Andhra Pradesh scheme for LPG subsidies, he continued by saying that programmable features were being used for targeted transfers and subsidies.

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According to Malhotra, India's fintech industry, which currently has over 10,000 businesses and $40 billion in investment over the last ten years, has profited from a sizable pool of tech talent, a varied financial ecosystem, and supportive regulations and government policies. He declared, "We will keep facilitating this so that fintechs can utilize the financial ecosystem and digital public infrastructure for the economy's overall benefit."