Everything You Should Know About Micro ATM Machine

In the age of digital transformation, financial offerings are evolving unexpectedly to cater to the various needs of a developing population. One such innovation that has received massive attention is the Micro ATM Machine.

This compact and versatile tool has come to be a game-changer, specifically in areas where traditional banking infrastructure is confined. It is a blessing in disguise for rural people who are far off from using urban equipment.

Let’s explore everything you need to know about Micro ATMs and how they’re revolutionizing economic inclusion.

What is a Micro ATM?

A Micro ATM also known as a mini atm is a handheld tool that plays the functions of an everyday ATM however on a smaller scale.

It permits customers to conduct primary banking transactions together with micro atm cash withdrawals, deposits, fund transfers, and balance inquiries.

The primary objective of Micro ATMs is to extend banking services to underserved and far-off regions wherein setting up conventional branches is probably impractical.

With these simple tools, Rural areas can also take advantage of urban equipment and become financially independent.

Key Features of Micro ATMs

Portable and Lightweight

Micro ATMs are designed to be compact and lightweight, making them easier to move and use in numerous locations. This function is useful in rural and remote areas in which infrastructure is confined. So then can be transported and carried out to various destinations without the need of loading heaving products.

Biometric Authentication

Micro ATMs frequently come geared up with biometric authentication capabilities, including fingerprint scanning, to ensure steady transactions.

This provides an additional layer of safety and reduces the reliance on traditional ATM cards.

This feature is very much essential to ensure the security and safety of transactions.

Connectivity Options

Micro ATMs can function on numerous connectivity options, together with GPRS, Wi-Fi, and Bluetooth. This flexibility guarantees that these devices can be functional even in regions with confined network insurance.

Multilingual Support

Recognizing the linguistic range of various areas, Micro ATMs frequently guide more than one language. This makes the devices more user-friendly and reachable to humans with varying language alternatives.

Benefits of Micro ATMs

Financial Inclusion

Micro ATMs play a crucial role in promoting financial inclusion by using banking services in regions where traditional banks won’t have a physical presence. This facilitates people in far-flung places access to basic economic services without the need to travel far-off destinations

Reduced Cash Handling

By facilitating digital transactions, Micro ATMs contribute to the discount of cash management, which may be a safety concern. This shift closer to digital transactions enhances the general safety of economic operations.

Cost-Effective

Setting up conventional r branches involves significant costs. Micro ATMs provide a cost-effective opportunity, allowing financial institutions to enlarge their reach without incurring high infrastructure charges. The Micro ATM prices are very low as compared to general ATMs to make it more accessible.

Convenience for Businesses

Micro ATMs can serve more than just individual customers. Businesses, specifically in rural regions, can advantage of those Atms by dealing with cash transactions efficiently, decreasing the need for manual document-retaining and enhancing typical economic control.

Transaction History and Receipts

Users can receive transaction receipts for every transaction conducted through a Micro ATM. Additionally, the device keeps a record of transaction history, allowing users to review their financial activities.

Benefits of Micro ATMs

Financial Inclusion

Reduced Cash Handling

Cost-Effective

Setting up conventional brick-and-mortar branches involves significant costs. Micro ATMs provide a cost-effective opportunity, allowing financial institutions to enlarge their reach without incurring extensive infrastructure charges.

Convenience for Businesses

Summing Up

Micro ATMs are a testament to the transformative power of technology in the financial sector.

By bridging the gap between traditional banking offerings and the rural population these devices are contributing to a greater population and are highly accessible to the financial atmosphere.

As technology continues to evolve, Micro ATMs will possibly play an increasingly essential position in shaping the future of banking, making financial services more accessible to everyone, no matter their geographical location.

October 26, 2023November 16, 2023

5 Reasons you need a Financial distributor

Health is wealth. Good health is not just the absence of any illness, but complete physical and mental wellness of an individual.

In today’s world, stress affects both physical and mental health – and one contributor to stress is the state an individual’s finances.

We all have financial goals we want to reach, and savings just don’t cut it. It’s important to invest. While we invest, how do we know we’re doing the right thing for our goals?

Here’s where your financial doctor, or advisor, comes into the picture. Just like you need a doctor for your physical or mental health, you need one for your finances too.

So, how can your financial doctor help you?

Understand your financial health –Your financial advisor will work with you to assess your current financial health – your assets, liabilities, income and expenses. He/she will also consider any expected future obligations (insurance, taxes, other long-term expenses) and sources of income (pension, gifts, etc.) to get a complete picture of where you stand.
Assess your goals –Once your advisor maps out where you stand, he/she will understand your investment goals, time frame and risk appetite. An understanding of risk appetite will allow your advisor to determine your asset allocation. He/she will also assess your retirement needs at this stage.
Build the financial plan –The next stage is where your advisor charts out a comprehensive financial plan for your goals. This plan will include details such as where to invest, how much to invest, for how long to invest. He/she has the expertise to understand how all these products will work in tandem for you to achieve your goals. The plan will also look at your retirement plan, your projected withdrawal rates during retirement and have the best- and worst-case scenarios for your expected life span. If you’re already investing for your goals, your advisor will review your current habits and suggest a course of action. If you’re investing without goals in mind, your advisor will help you allocate your existing investments for your goals. Read why goal-based investing is important here. Once your plan is ready, it’s on you to implement it.
Help you understand where you’re investing –When building your financial plan, it is important to understand the products you’re investing in. The pros and cons, how it fits in your portfolio, what it can do for you – your advisor will help you with this.
Regular reviews and adjustments –It’s a good idea to revisit your investments regularly to check if you’re on track, review what you’re doing and see if you need to adjust your plan to incorporate new goals or modify/remove existing ones. Depending on your needs, your advisor will suggest changes to take you closer to your goals.

October 25, 2023November 16, 2023

7 bonus ideas you need in your life!

It’s the end of another financial year, and many of you will be receiving your annual performance bonus. Exciting time, isn’t it? I bet you’ve got fantastic plans of how to splurge it. I’ve got them too, with a little boring, but necessary checklist I thought I should share.

I hope that maybe it helps you too. Without further ado, here’s 7 bonus ideas you need in your life.

Pay off debt: Credit card bills, student loans, vehicle or home loans, you could have any of these. It might be a good idea to pay these bills and also set aside some money for any future loans you may be considering. This will minimise the principal amount you owe and you can save on hefty interest payments.
Add to your retirement fund: Your retirement may be a long way off, but no one tells you it’s one of the first goals you should start saving for. Why? Look at cost of living today. If you spend 30,000 a month today as living expenses, 20 years down the line assuming inflation is at 6%, you’ll be spending 1.72 lakhs a month. Start putting aside a little by little with a Systematic Investment Plan in mutual funds to build wealth for your retirement. You can also invest in NPS and PPF for relative safety. Use a retirement calculator to figure out how much your SIP amount should be.
Build an emergency fund: Life is unpredictable. So, isn’t it a smart move to be prepared? You may lose your job, or your company isn’t doing well and can’t pay salaries, or for some reason, there is little or no income. It’s ideal to have at least 6 months of expenses saved in an emergency fund. Do not touch this unless it truly is an emergency. Consider a liquid fund for this. Frivolous purchases are not emergencies and can be planned.
Invest for longer term, big ticket goals: You’ve got a lumpsum in hand, why blow it all up now? You may want to purchase a car in the future, make the down payment on a house, fund your child’s higher education, or even start a business. Whatever your goal may be, no matter how far, start setting aside funds today for it. You can even start a SIP in mutual funds. Time and compounding will work for you.
Get insurance: Ever considered who will take care of your family should anything happen to you? Get a term plan to secure your family financially in case you die. The earlier you get it, the lesser the premiums cost. Don’t delay this until next year.
Buy health cover for your family: Health is wealth, and when your bonus can help you secure your family’s health, why not? There could be a time when your employer’s health cover may not be enough to cover all expenses. Consider purchasing a family floater health plan.

October 24, 2023November 16, 2023

Breaking Down Debt Mutual Funds

Debt mutual funds are those that invest in fixed income instruments – such as corporate and government bonds, overnight securities, corporate debt securities, money market instruments etc. These funds are ideal for investors who are averse to risk and seek to generate regular income.

Debt funds are a good tool to use if you want steady income with low volatility and higher than bank returns. They also come with greater tax-efficiency than these products. We’ll address the advantages of debt funds and compare them with similar products in another article.

Let’s look at how SEBI has categorized debt funds.

Overnight Funds

These funds invest in overnight securities having a maturity of 1 day. They are the least risky of all debt fund categories, and this low risk comes with low returns. How these funds work is that at the beginning of each day, the AUM is invested in overnight securities, and since they mature the next day, the fund manager can buy fresh overnight bonds the next day using the principal and return earned. NAV of this fund will increase little by little over time. The advantage of this is that changes in the RBI rate, credit rating of the borrower do not affect your investment.

Liquid Funds

Liquid funds invest in debt and money market securities such as treasury bills, government securities, call money with a maturity of up to 91 days. These are a good tool to use to park surpluses and to build an emergency fund. These can also be used to transfer that surplus to an equity fund using a Systematic Transfer Plan (STP). What’s interesting to note is that some liquid funds even come with an instant redemption facility.

Money Market Funds

Money market funds invest in money market instruments such as commercial papers, certificates of deposit, treasury bills, repo agreements of the highest quality with a maturity of up to 1 year. These are suitable for investors with low risk appetite and an investment horizon of at least a year.

Corporate Bond Funds

Corporate Bond Funds invest in debt instruments issued by companies. These instruments comprise of the highest rated bonds, debentures, commercial papers and structured obligations. Minimum investment in corporate bonds by these funds is 80% of the AUM. They are suitable for investors with an investment tenure of 3-5 years.

Credit Risk Funds

Credit-risk funds are debt funds that invest at least 65% of total assets in papers rated less than AA (not of the highest quality). As these funds take on more risk than most other debt funds, they come with the ability to generate higher returns too. It is suitable for investors who can assume high risk and have an investment horizon of at least 3 years.

Banking and PSU Funds

Banking and PSU debt funds invest at least 80% of their corpus in debt instruments of banks, Public Sector Undertakings and Public Financial Institutions. They come with low risk and are suitable for investors who have an investment horizon of 1-2 years.

Duration funds

Duration funds invest in debt and money market instruments that have different maturities. Based on the maturity of instruments, they are classified into ultra-short (3-6 months), low duration (6-12 months), short duration (1-3 years), medium duration (3-4 years), medium to long duration (4-7 years), long duration (7+ years). The longer the tenure of the fund, the higher its ability to take risk. Investors in these funds should invest if the maturities are in line with their investment horizon as the fund will take this time to give an investor his principal and the interest owed to him (Macaulay duration) for investing in the fund.

Dynamic Bond Funds

Dynamic bond funds invest in instruments with varying durations. These are actively managed funds and are suitable for investors who find it difficult to judge interest rate movement and have an investment horizon of 3+ years. This is because these funds hold securities with reducing portfolio maturity when interest rates rise and increasing portfolio maturity when interest rates fall.

Gilt Funds

Gilt funds invest at least 80% of their total assets in Government securities (G-secs). These are issued by central and state governments across various tenures, both long and short. They usually have no default risk as these are government backed. They do come with higher interest rate risk for instruments with higher maturities. These funds are suitable for investors with an investment horizon of 3+ years and benefit the most in a falling interest rate environment.

Gilt Fund with 10-year constant duration

Gilt funds as discussed earlier invest in government securities. In the case of funds with a 10-year constant duration, assets held in the fund have a Macaulay duration of 10 years and are suitable for investors with this investment horizon in mind.

Floater Funds

Floater funds invest a minimum of 65% of assets in floating rate instruments and the rest in fixed income securities. Floating rate instruments are those that don’t have a fixed interest. If interest rates rise, the interest from these funds also rise immediately. These funds invest in securities that have medium to long-term maturities.

Fixed Maturity Plans (FMPs)

FMPs are passively managed close-ended funds, where investments are held to maturity. These can be considered as an alternative to FDs as they have the potential to deliver FD beating returns. Another advantage they have over FDs are that they come with better tax-efficiency. We will discuss tax-efficieny of mutual funds in another article.

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Category: Articles

Everything You Should Know About Micro ATM Machine

What is a Micro ATM?

Key Features of Micro ATMs