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Reserve Bank of India cancels Paytm Payments Bank licence
Central bank cites compliance failures; curbs tighten as wind-up looms
MUMBAI: India’s banking watchdog delivered its sharpest blow yet to Paytm Payments Bank, cancelling its licence and effectively ending its ability to operate as a bank under the law.
The Reserve Bank of India said the entity can no longer conduct banking business under the Banking Regulation Act, citing concerns that its affairs were not being run in the interest of depositors or the public and that it had failed to meet licence conditions.
The move escalates a crackdown that has been building for months. The bank had already been barred from onboarding new customers since March 11, 2022, and later faced restrictions on deposits, credit and wallet top-ups. In January 2024, the central bank ordered it to stop accepting fresh deposits, pointing to persistent non-compliance, including lapses in customer due diligence, use of funds and technology systems.
Operationally, the bank is now on a tight leash. It may process withdrawals of existing deposits and facilitate loan referrals through banking correspondents, but it cannot take fresh deposits.
The central bank said it would apply to the high court to wind up the bank.
Paytm sought to ringfence the fallout. In a regulatory filing, it said the licence cancellation applies to Paytm Payments Bank Limited, a separate entity, and should not be attributed to One 97 Communications. It added that there is no exposure or material business arrangement with the bank and that it operates independently, without Paytm’s board or management involvement.
“As informed earlier, Paytm (One 97 Communications Limited) and its services, which have been operating without interruption, will continue to operate uninterrupted. These include the Paytm app, Paytm UPI, Paytm Gold and all other services offered by its subsidiaries and associated companies,” the company said.
The distinction may reassure users of the app ecosystem, but the regulator’s verdict is unequivocal. After years of warnings, caps and curbs, the payments bank experiment at Paytm is being shut down—decisively, and with little room left to manoeuvre.
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Reliance Industries posts record revenue; profit jumps 18%
India’s biggest conglomerate posts record revenues of $124 billion, even as a Middle East energy shock rattles its oil refining business in the final quarter
MUMBAI: Reliance Industries, the Mumbai-based colossus that spans mobile networks to movie studios, crude oil to carbonated drinks, has done it again. Despite a year of geopolitical convulsions, tariff wars and an energy-market shock of historic proportions, the group powered through FY2025-26 with revenues of Rs 11,75,919 crore ($124 billion), up nearly 10 per cent, and a net profit of Rs 95,754 crore ($10.1 billion), up a thumping 18 per cent year on year.
The numbers, presented to analysts in Mumbai on 24 April 2026, underscore an uncomfortable truth for Reliance’s rivals: the group’s sheer diversification has become its most formidable weapon.
The consumer engine roars
The group’s consumer-facing businesses — digital services, retail and media — now account for more than 55 per cent of consolidated earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA), which came in at Rs 2,07,911 crore ($21.9 billion), up 13 per cent. That shift, accelerating with every passing quarter, is precisely the buffer that saved Reliance when the energy markets went haywire in March 2026.
Jio Platforms, the group’s digital juggernaut, was the standout performer. Revenue from operations climbed 14.6 per cent to Rs 1,46,885 crore, while EBITDA surged 18.8 per cent to Rs 76,255 crore, with margins nudging past 52 per cent — up 190 basis points on the year. The connectivity business added 36.3 million subscribers across the year to reach a base of 524 million, making it one of the largest mobile operators on the planet. More than 268 million of those subscribers are now on 5G, and fixed broadband connections crossed 27 million, with JioAirFiber accounting for over 75 per cent of net additions. Data traffic ballooned 30.8 per cent to 241 exabytes for the full year. Profit after tax at Jio Platforms crossed Rs 30,000 crore, rising 15.1 per cent.
Reliance Retail, the country’s largest retailer by almost any measure, delivered gross revenues of Rs 3,70,026 crore, up 12 per cent, from a sprawling estate of 20,160 stores covering 78.3 million square feet. JioMart, its hyper-local commerce arm, saw average daily orders in the fourth quarter rocket more than 300 per cent year on year. Full-year profit after tax at the retail unit climbed 11.7 per cent to nearly Rs 14,000 crore. The registered customer base hit 387 million, and the platform processed 1.93 billion transactions during the year, up 39 per cent.
The fast-moving consumer goods arm, Reliance Consumer Products, was the group’s most explosive growth story in percentage terms. Full-year gross revenues doubled to Rs 22,000 crore. Campa Cola, the revived Indian soda brand, notched sales exceeding Rs 4,700 crore, making it India’s fourth-largest carbonated soft drinks label with double-digit market share in key states. The Independence grocery brand crossed Rs 2,600 crore in sales. The unit now sells into more than 40 countries.
JioHotstar, the streaming platform born from the merger of Jio Cinema and Disney+ Hotstar in late 2024, reached approximately 550 million monthly active users in March 2026 — a new benchmark for any streaming service outside China. Its broadcast of the ICC T20 World Cup 2026 drew 72.5 million simultaneous streams, a global concurrency record. Meanwhile, Jio Studios cemented its claim as India’s number-one content studio, with the Dhurandhar duology — films released in 2025 and 2026 respectively — becoming the highest-grossing Hindi films for two consecutive years and the first Indian franchise to cross Rs 3,000 crore worldwide.
When the Gulf caught fire
Then came March 2026 and, with it, a jolt that no amount of consumer-business diversification could entirely absorb. A prolonged Middle East conflict slashed flows through the Strait of Hormuz from 20 million barrels a day to just 3.8 million barrels. Dubai crude briefly touched $168 per barrel. LNG spot prices more than doubled. The rupee, already under pressure, shed 11 per cent across the year — its sharpest annual fall in over a decade.
For Reliance’s oil-to-chemicals (O2C) division, the world’s largest single-site refinery complex at Jamnagar, the quarter was a bruising one. Throughput dipped to 19.5 million metric tonnes from 20.3 million a year earlier. Under-recoveries on domestic fuel sales bit deep, the special additional excise duty (SAED) was reintroduced, crude premiums on physical barrels hit extraordinary levels, and naphtha prices climbed 13 per cent year on year, squeezing polymer margins. Fourth-quarter EBITDA from O2C fell 3.7 per cent to Rs 14,520 crore, with margins contracting 130 basis points to 7.9 per cent.
For the full year, though, the O2C business told a more resilient story. Revenue rose 5.7 per cent to Rs 6,62,401 crore and EBITDA climbed 10.1 per cent to Rs 60,546 crore, aided by an extraordinary surge in fuel cracks — gasoil up 63 per cent, ATF up 68 per cent, gasoline up 34 per cent over FY25 averages — that preceded the worst of the disruption. Ethane cracking from the United States, a strategic hedge Reliance has long cultivated, continued to deliver a decisive cost advantage over naphtha-based peers across Asia.
The Oil and Gas division, which produces gas from the KG-D6 deepwater block off India’s east coast, saw EBITDA fall 10.1 per cent to Rs 19,050 crore, as production declined 8.2 per cent by natural depletion and gas ceiling prices were cut to $8.9 per MMBtu for the first half of FY27. Coalbed methane output, however, rose 10 per cent.
The balance sheet holds firm
In the year’s most reassuring subplot, the group’s finances remain remarkably solid. Net debt stood at Rs 1,24,717 crore at year-end, with a net debt-to-EBITDA ratio of 0.64 times — well below one times and supporting a credit rating above the sovereign. Capital expenditure for the year rose to Rs 1,44,271 crore, funded comfortably by cash profit of Rs 1,71,258 crore, itself a new record. Standalone PAT at RIL, boosted in part by Rs 8,924 crore from the sale of listed investments, rose 24.4 per cent to Rs 43,851 crore.
In New Energy, the group’s most audacious long-term bet, progress was tangible. Reliance became the first company in India to win Approved List of Models and Manufacturers (ALMM) certification for heterojunction technology (HJT) solar cells and modules. Battery manufacturing is being scaled towards 100 GWh annually, with the first 40 GWh phase on track for commissioning this year. And at Kutch in Gujarat, work is under way on what the company describes as the world’s largest renewable energy project, targeting more than 150 GWp of installed capacity. A $3 billion long-term supply agreement for green ammonia with South Korea’s Samsung C&T, beginning in 2029 and running for 15 years, signals that this is no paper ambition.
The view from here
The fourth-quarter numbers, taken in isolation, had their blemishes. Consolidated revenue rose 12.9 per cent to Rs 3,25,290 crore, but EBITDA was essentially flat at Rs 48,588 crore, and PAT fell 8.9 per cent to Rs 20,589 crore as higher depreciation from 5G spectrum assets and elevated finance costs weighed on the bottom line. The energy shock that rattled the final weeks of the fiscal year is not going away quickly: oil markets face prolonged uncertainty, the rupee remains under pressure and the reintroduction of SAED is an unwelcome policy variable.
Yet zoom out, and the picture that emerges is one of a conglomerate that has, over five years, doubled its consolidated EBITDA; built a digital services business worth more than $8 billion in annual EBITDA; turned a near-dormant oil-and-gas field into a gusher generating Rs 19,000 crore a year; and created an FMCG empire from scratch that is already terrifying established players. It has done all of this while keeping its balance sheet clean and its credit rating pristine.
Mukesh Ambani’s machine has faced tariffs, artificial intelligence-induced disruption and open conflict in the world’s most critical energy corridor — and it has still delivered. The Strait of Hormuz may be half-blocked, but Reliance’s growth story remains wide open.
