/dhanam-english/media/media_files/N6r1vH0eJ61kp5xMdpXv.jpg)
A new survey has shown that nearly 53 percent of women taking loans for business purposes prefer to use gold or property as collateral. Image: livemint.com
Gold remains one of the most popular items among ‘fashion and lifestyle’ for women shoppers in the country.
However, it also holds immense significance among women when it comes to raising funds in emergencies.
As more Indian women are looking to start their businesses, the yellow metal has emerged as one of the most common forms of collateral to raise funds, revealed a new survey, ‘Women and Finance.’
The survey conducted by CRISIL and DBS Bank India found that gold and property are the most preferred collateral options when women entrepreneurs opt for a loan.
The trend is highest in Chennai, followed by Mumbai and Delhi.The option of keeping gold to raise funds for business is least preferred in Kolkata, where only 11 percent of self-employed women use gold as collateral.
Bank loans come second
The report also revealed that 21 percent of women entrepreneurs prefer a bank loan to fund their business.
The low percentage indicates the need to improve women's access to finance options in India.
In metro cities, nearly 65 percent of self-employed women have not taken any business loan, and 39 percent of them rely on their personal savings to fund enterprises.
Chennai top in use of gold as collateral
In Chennai, nearly 52 percent of self-employed women prefer gold as collateral for taking business loans.
Only 22-25 percent of women entrepreneurs in Mumbai and Delhi prefer this option.
The trend was most dominant among female millennials, as 23 percent of self-employed women aged 36-45 years used gold as collateral.
The percentage was lower in women of other age categories.
UPI: Most preferred for transaction
Highlighting the success of programmes like ‘Digital India’, the report revealed the massive popularity of the use of digital payment methods for transactions among women entrepreneurs.
According to the survey, “73 percent of self-employed women preferred receiving payments from customers digitally, and 87 percent used digital methods to pay their business expenses.”
The survey revealed that the UPI payment mode was used for both receiving (35 percent) and paying (26 percent) business expenses.
Despite its popularity, most of the women used cash for payroll and operational expenses.
(By arragement with livemint.com)
