Circle and Near Invest $14M in Remittances App for Indian Diaspora

Remittance app Abound raised $14 million in a seed round following investment from crypto heavyweights Circle Ventures and the Near Foundation. The app aims to be a financial bridge between non-resident Indians (NRIs) and India, and has processed $150 million worth of remittances with about 500,000 monthly active users. Abound is incubated by the digital arm of the Times of India Group, one of the country's largest news agencies. “Indians in America have a unique financial reality — one that spans two countries, two economies, and two currencies. Yet, the financial services available today weren’t designed for their needs,” said Nishkaam Mehta, CEO of Abound, in a statement. The investment will be used to scale the business by hiring in several key roles and enhancing its technology infrastructure, a press release said. Jeremy Fox-Geen, Circle's CFO, added in a statement that stablecoins and digital payment infrastructure are revolutionizing global finance, especially for diaspora communities. Circle is the issuer of USDC, a stablecoin pegged to the U.S. dollar that has a market cap of $59 billion. A 2024 report outlined that the stablecoin sector had settled $10.8 trillion worth of transactions in 2023, of which $2.3 trillion were related to payments and cross-border remittances.