The exits come even as several of these firms are still in recovery mode, navigating valuation markdowns, tighter scrutiny from the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), and a shift in investor sentiment away from high-growth, high-risk lending plays.
“Regulatory tightening by the RBI has put added pressure on financial strategy and compliance. Second, the shift from growth to profitability has made the CFO’s role more demanding. Third, many boards are pushing for governance resets to restore investor trust,” said Rohit Srivastava, senior partner at executive search and advisory firm Longhouse.
The RBI has introduced a series of regulatory tightening measures over the last two to three years. The digital lending guidelines of 2022 mandated greater disclosures and restrictions on first-loss default guarantee models, among other tightening measures.
In November 2023, the central bank directed banks and non-banking financial companies (NBFCs) to provision more capital against unsecured loans and asked lenders to moderate their exposure to high-risk retail segments.
Hit by RBI’s crackdown, players in the segment spent 2024 cleaning up books, cutting risky loan portfolios, and shifting to secured and co-lending models. Growth took a backseat as firms focused on stability, compliance, and survival, a reset from their earlier breakneck expansion.
In the larger fintech ecosystem, “…some CFOs have left to start their own ventures. In many cases, companies are promoting internal candidates or moving executives across group companies to fill CFO roles. And increasingly, founders—especially those with finance backgrounds—are taking over CFO responsibilities themselves,” Srivastava added.
According to Longhouse data, close to a dozen CFO transitions have taken place across fintechs—including Zerodha, Paytm, and Paisabazaar—since 2023, where the average tenure stood at around 3.5 years. The recent exits in lending have hit much lower than this average, at 1.3 years.
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The churn
CFOs at Lendingkart, Balance Hero, and Cashe, all players offering quick, unsecured credit, have stepped down between December and March, Mint has learnt.
Mukund Barsagade, the CFO of Fullerton Financial Holdings-backed Lendingkart, exited the company in December after just nine months in the role, people in the know told Mint. He was preceded by Mohit Bajaj, who also left within nine months of joining the lending firm in 2020.
Barsagade joined Utkarsh Small Finance Bank as its head of strategy and transformation in December, according to an update on his profile on the professional networking platform LinkedIn.
Meanwhile, Jayesh Jain, CFO of SoftBank Ventures Asia-backed Balance Hero’s India subsidiary True Balance, left the company in February. Jain later joined commercial vehicle financier IndoStar Capital Finance Ltd. as CFO, an update on his LinkedIn profile showed.
In March, Gaurav Surana, CFO of Bhanix Finance and Investment Ltd-run Cashe, also stepped down. Cashe spokesperson confirmed the exit of its current CFO and said Talib Lokhandwala, who previously served as the company’s CFO prior to Surana’s tenure, will be taking up the position again.
“The unsecured lending sector in India has seen dynamic changes in recent years, with leadership movements often reflecting the industry’s evolving landscape. While we haven’t witnessed notable CXO-level changes among peer companies recently, the sector’s rapid growth, regulatory developments, and competitive pressures can naturally lead to organisational realignments from time to time,” added the Cashe spokesperson.
Meanwhile, Fullerton-backed Lendingkart has roped in former DBS Bank executive Prashant Joshi as CEO, effective 1 April 2025, Moneycontrol reported on Tuesday. The leadership changes at Lendingkart come after Temasek’s Fullerton Financial Holdings acquired a majority stake in the company.
Lendingkart, once valued at $690 million, saw its valuation drop to around $100 million after the funding round last year.
Queries sent to Lendingkart and Balance Hero remained unanswered at the time of publishing. It remains unclear if the two companies have found replacements yet.
With many fintechs continuing to recalibrate strategies and attempt to retain investor trust, leadership continuity in some functions may become increasingly challenging.
Also Read: IPO-bound Lenskart’s CFO quits; likely to join Coke India as finance chief
