Vested Finance raises $12m in Series A funding

By Leandra Monteiro

Vested Finance, a California-headquartered online investment platform that enables Indian investors to invest in the US stock market, has raised $ 12 million in Series A funding. Ayon Capital led the round while the company received continued support from existing investors Tenoneten, Ovo Fund, Wedbush Ventures, IPV, and Upscale. New investors including 9Unicorns, Ankur Warikoo (ex-CEO of Groupon India), Dhruvil Sanghvi (CEO at Loginext), and Saumil Parekh (VP of Marketing at PharmEasy) have also come on board.

Vested Finance stays committed to its aim of providing access to global wealth creation opportunities in an easy and cost-effective manner. A major step in this direction was achieved through the launch of Vested Direct which enables Indian investors to begin their US investing journey in just one day. Earlier it would take around 5 days. Vested Direct also substantially reduces the fund transfer costs with zero transaction fees and a fixed forex markup of 1.2%, one of the lowest in the industry. Recently, they also introduced features that allow investors to invest in stocks and ETFs on a recurring basis and to create their own portfolios (Vests).

Viram Shah, Co-Founder & CEO, Vested Finance said, “Today, the location where we are born determines the kind of wealth creation opportunities we get access to and that is unfair. Most of our portfolios lack global diversification. We want to enable investors across the globe to access global wealth creation opportunities in an easy and cost-effective manner. The growth that we have seen over the years is testimony to the interest of Indian investors in investing in the US markets. We want to use the funds to scale our team globally and expand our product suite to launch complementary products in the cross-border space while continuing to grow the core US investing user base.”

Speaking about the fundraising, Rahul Pagidipati, Managing Partner, Ayon Capital said, “For Ayon, leading this new round was an easy decision. Viram and his team are committed to their mission of making diverse markets accessible to Indian investors. Moreover, they have a strong culture and have shown their ability to be creative on the strategy side and execute with discipline. Vested is an integral part of Ayon’s plan to provide a diversified suite of products for the large and growing Indian investor community to preserve and build their wealth.”