RBI penalises four P2P lenders including Faircent over 2017 rules

What the Record Shows

The Reserve Bank of India imposed monetary penalties on four peer-to-peer (P2P) lending companies for non-compliance with its Non-Banking Financial Company - Peer to Peer Lending Platform (Reserve Bank) Directions, 2017. The four press releases, all issued on 7 March 2025, named Fairassets Technologies India Private Limited, which operates the Faircent platform; Visionary Financepeer Private Limited; Bridge Fintech Solutions Private Limited, which operates Finzy; and Rang De P2P Financial Services Limited. The penalties totalled Rs 76.6 lakh.

The largest fell on Fairassets Technologies (Faircent), which the RBI penalised Rs 40 lakh by an order dated 11 February 2025. Visionary Financepeer was penalised Rs 16.60 lakh by an order dated 25 February 2025. Bridge Fintech Solutions (Finzy) was penalised Rs 10 lakh by an order dated 4 March 2025, and Rang De P2P Financial Services Rs 10 lakh by an order dated 25 February 2025. Each penalty was imposed in exercise of the powers under Section 58G(1)(b) read with Section 58B(5)(aa) of the Reserve Bank of India Act, 1934.

The RBI attached to every one of the four releases its standard caveat that the action rests on deficiencies in regulatory compliance and is "not intended to pronounce upon the validity of any transaction or agreement" a company entered into with its customers. In other words, these are compliance penalties measured against the P2P rulebook, not findings of fraud and not a verdict on any single loan. No individual was named in any of the four orders; the regulated entities themselves were the respondents. None of the four orders was framed as interim or ex-parte; each is a final penalty following a show-cause process.

How It Worked

The 2017 Directions set the guardrails for the P2P model, under which a licensed platform is meant to be a neutral marketplace: it matches individual lenders with individual borrowers, but it does not itself lend, borrow or carry credit risk. The RBI's examinations found, per the four orders, that the platforms had drifted from that template in overlapping ways.

A charge common to the group was that the companies disbursed loans to individual borrowers without the specific approval of the individual lenders whose money was being lent. The Directions require lender-by-lender consent for each exposure, and the RBI found this was not consistently obtained. The RBI also found, across the group, that the platforms had not undertaken and disclosed to prospective lenders the credit assessment and risk profile of borrowers - the very information the Directions entitle a lender to see before deciding to fund a loan.

A third common finding was that the companies took on partial credit risk by foregoing their management or service fees, in whole or in part, which falls outside the activities a P2P platform is permitted to carry on. Foregoing a fee to keep a soured loan performing shifts default risk onto the platform, which the model is designed to prevent.

Individual orders added company-specific findings. In Faircent's case the RBI found a breach of the Fund Transfer Mechanism: repayments to lenders were, per the order, made out of fresh funds brought in by new or existing lenders rather than strictly from the borrower's own repayment. For Visionary Financepeer the RBI found there was no Board-approved policy for pricing its services and that the company had not ensured that each individual lender and borrower signed a loan agreement. For Faircent, Finzy and Visionary the RBI additionally found that service-provider agreements did not incorporate the RBI's right of inspection and that annual reviews of those service providers had not been carried out.

The action followed the RBI's supervisory process. In Rang De's case the release records that a supervisory examination in September 2023 preceded the order. In each matter the company was issued a notice asking why a penalty should not be imposed, and after considering the replies the RBI concluded the charge of non-compliance was sustained and warranted a monetary penalty.

Who Lost Money

No investor-loss figure is attached to these orders, and it is important to be exact about that: the RBI's penalties are compliance sanctions paid by the companies to the regulator, not compensation to any lender. The caveat in each release makes the same point from the other direction, expressly declining to pronounce on the validity of transactions with customers.

The people the Directions are written to protect are the retail lenders who fund loans on these platforms. Where a platform disburses without a lender's specific approval, or does not show a lender the borrower's credit profile, the lender is making a funding decision without the information the rulebook guarantees. Where a platform quietly absorbs part of the default risk by waiving its fees, the marketplace stops being a pure pass-through and starts to resemble the pooled, risk-carrying model that P2P licences are specifically not meant to permit. The concern the orders speak to is that risk sat in a different place from where lenders would have understood it to sit.

That the four orders landed on the same day, against four separate platforms, for a substantially overlapping set of breaches, is itself the signal: the RBI was addressing a pattern across the sub-sector rather than a single outlier. Retail lenders on any P2P platform can read the orders as a checklist of the protections the Directions are supposed to deliver.

Where It Stands Now

As of today the four penalties stand as final monetary penalties imposed by the Reserve Bank. They were not interim or ex-parte orders; each followed a show-cause notice and the company's reply. A penalty under Section 58G of the RBI Act can in principle be challenged through the available legal channels, but the public record shows no order staying, reducing or setting aside any of the four penalties.

The amounts - Rs 40 lakh, Rs 16.60 lakh, Rs 10 lakh and Rs 10 lakh - are modest relative to the platforms' loan books, and the RBI has stressed that a penalty is a sanction for the compliance failure rather than a measure of the underlying conduct. The orders do not suspend any licence or bar any platform from operating; they require the companies to pay and to bring their practices into line with the Directions.

This sweep sits within a wider tightening of the P2P segment. The RBI penalised the operators of LiquiLoans and LenDenClub over similar P2P-lending lapses, and in August 2024 it amended the 2017 Directions to close off precisely the practices - fee-cushioned risk-taking, pooled repayment flows and inadequate disclosure - that recur in these orders. The full run of such actions sits in Oquilia's enforcement archive.

What It Means

For a retail lender, the practical lesson is that a P2P platform's promise rests on the Directions being followed, not merely on the platform being licensed. The protections that matter - your specific approval before your money is lent, sight of the borrower's credit profile and risk grade, a genuine one-to-one loan agreement, and a platform that does not silently stand behind the credit - are exactly the items the RBI found wanting here.

Two concrete checks follow. First, anyone can confirm whether a platform holds a valid NBFC-P2P Certificate of Registration on the RBI website before lending through it. Second, a lender should expect to see, and be able to approve, each individual loan and the borrower information behind it; a platform that lends "on your behalf" into a pool is not operating the model the licence permits.

Because P2P returns are neither assured nor insured, a lender weighing a platform's advertised return can sensibly compare it against a plain fixed deposit or a lump-sum investment before deciding how much capital to expose. This is reporting on a regulatory action, not advice to use or avoid any platform.

FAQ

What exactly did the RBI order?

On 7 March 2025 the Reserve Bank imposed monetary penalties totalling Rs 76.6 lakh on four NBFC-P2P companies - Fairassets Technologies (Faircent) Rs 40 lakh, Visionary Financepeer Rs 16.60 lakh, Bridge Fintech (Finzy) Rs 10 lakh and Rang De P2P Rs 10 lakh - for non-compliance with the 2017 P2P Lending Directions.

Did the RBI find that the platforms committed fraud?

No. The RBI expressly said the action rests on deficiencies in regulatory compliance and does not pronounce on the validity of any transaction with customers. These are penalties for breaching specific rules in the Directions, not findings of fraud, and no individual was named in the orders.

What rules did the RBI find were breached?

Common findings included disbursing loans without the specific approval of individual lenders, not disclosing borrowers' credit assessment and risk profile to lenders, and taking partial credit risk by waiving fees. Individual orders added findings on fund-transfer mechanics, pricing policy, loan agreements and service-provider oversight.

Can the penalties be appealed?

A penalty imposed under Section 58G of the RBI Act can be contested through the available legal channels. As of today the public record shows no stay, reduction or reversal of any of the four penalties, so they stand as imposed.

Did any lender get money back?

These penalties are paid by the companies to the regulator; they are not compensation to lenders. No investor-loss or refund figure is attached to the orders, which addressed compliance with the Directions rather than any specific lender's claim.

How do I check whether a P2P platform is registered?

Every NBFC-P2P must hold a Certificate of Registration from the RBI. You can verify a company's registration on the RBI website's list of registered NBFCs before lending, and you are entitled under the Directions to approve each loan and see the borrower's risk profile.

This report is based on the Reserve Bank of India press releases dated 7 March 2025 imposing monetary penalties on Fairassets Technologies (Faircent), Visionary Financepeer, Bridge Fintech (Finzy) and Rang De P2P, reviewed on 31 July 2026.