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Two days after the shock news that 86 per cent of India’s cash by value was being scrapped overnight, a full-page advertisement by a prominent digital payments business appeared on the front of several national newspapers.
当印度86%的现钞（以价值计）一夜之间将作废的爆炸性新闻传出两天后，一家知名数字化支付企业在若干家全国性报纸上打了整版的广告。
“Paytm congratulates Honorable Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi on taking the boldest decision in the financial history of independent India!” it read, accompanied by a full-length picture of the smiling leader.
广告上写着，“Paytm祝贺尊敬的总理纳伦德拉.莫迪(Narendra Modi)先生做出了印度独立以来的金融史上最大胆的决定！”，并附了一张莫迪面带微笑的全尺寸照片。
With queues snaking for hundreds of metres outside banks as people attempted to bank their savings, and poorer workers complaining of being unable to pay for food, the advert was met by a hail of criticism. But it also highlighted how Mr Modi’s decision will buoy some of the country’s fastest-growing financial technology companies.
考虑到银行门外蜿蜒排起的数百米长队（人们试图把储蓄存进银行），以及较为贫穷的劳动者在抱怨没法付款购买食品，这则广告受到了猛烈批评。但该广告也凸显出，莫迪的决定将如何提振印度发展极其迅速的金融科技企业。
“We have seen unprecedented growth over the past few days,” said Kiran Vasireddy, senior vice-president at Paytm, a lossmaking electronic wallet company that is backed by China’s Alibaba. “Our customer numbers have surged.”
Paytm高级副总裁基兰.瓦西雷迪(Kiran Vasireddy)表示：“过去几天我们见证了史无前例的增长。我们的用户人数大幅增加。”Paytm是一家处于亏损状态的电子钱包公司，中国的阿里巴巴(Alibaba)是其股东之一。
India has long been hooked on hard currency. Last year, 78 per cent of consumer transactions were made in cash — three to four times the level in developed economies. But its dominance is falling: five years ago, the figure was 89 per cent.
长期以来，印度一直坚持使用现金。去年，78%的消费者交易是用现金完成的，这一比例是发达经济体的三四倍。不过，现金在印度的主宰地位正在下滑：五年前，现金的使用比例是89%。
Since the start of this decade, dozens of companies have been established to offer bank customers the chance to fill a virtual wallet from their bank accounts, from which they can pay merchants using a single code.
2010年代初以来，印度成立了数十家数字化支付企业，向银行客户提供从银行户头向虚拟钱包充值的服务，客户可通过这种虚拟钱包使用一个号码向商家付款。
The largest two are Paytm, which was recently valued at $5bn, and MobiKwik, which is backed by a group of investors including Sequoia Capital, Tree Line Asia, American Express and Cisco.
在这些企业当中，最大的两家是Paytm和MobiKwik。Paytm最近的估值达到50亿美元，MobiKwik则得到了一系列投资者的投资，其中包括红杉资本(Sequoia Capital)、Tree Line Asia、美国运通(American Express)以及思科(Cisco)。
The fintech companies, either privately held or owned by larger conglomerates, have built up millions of customers in India’s biggest cities. Paytm boasts 150m users, while MobiKwik has 35m.
这些企业要么是私人持股，要么是归较大的财团所有。它们已在印度大城市建立了规模庞大的用户群。Paytm自诩拥有1.5亿用户，MobiKwik有3500万用户。
Last week’s announcement has fuelled the growth. In the first hour of business after the announcement, nearly $2m was added to Paytm accounts across the country — compared with an average of $200,000 a day. Since then 4m people have begun using Paytm wallets, according to the company. Traffic to its site has risen 700 per cent and app downloads are up 300 per cent.
上周宣布的决定对这些企业的发展起到了推动作用。消息公布后开业头一个小时内，印度全国各地Paytm账号上的资金增加了近200万美元，而一般一天只会增加20万美元。该公司称，消息公布以来已有400万人开始使用Paytm钱包。该公司网站的流量飙升了七倍，其应用下载次数增加了三倍。
MobiKwik has seen a similar effect: app downloads have increased 200 per cent, while the amount of money being added to wallets has gone up nearly 2,000 per cent.
MobiKwik遇到的情况与之类似：应用下载次数增加了两倍，虚拟钱包中充入的资金增加了近20倍。
