27 Feb 2025 Yamini Sagar of Instarails on Cross Border Payments
episode
Off the Rails from the U.S. Faster Payments Council - FPC
21 min
2 speakers
8 chapters
transcribed 1 month ago
Transcript
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Transcript generated automatically by AI and may contain errors.
What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
Off the rails from U.S. Faster Payment Council
Who are Reed Luhtanen and Yamini Sagar and what is this episode about?
I'm Reid Lutanen, Executive Director of the U.S. Faster Payments Council, and this is Off the Rails from the U.S. Faster Payments Council, sponsored by Open Payment Network. Today I'm talking with Yamini Sagar, CEO and founder of InstaRails. Yamini and I dive deep into cross-border payments, and we also share our go-to karaoke songs. But first, the headlines. Registration is open for FPC spring member meeting April 23rd and 24th at the beautiful, recently remodeled Westin Bayview in San Diego. This event is such a great opportunity to hear from experts who are making things happen, talk about the issues that matter for advancing faster payments, and to have fun with friends. We're going to have a lot more information about an evening event that we're planning.
You can rest assured it's going to be a great time. And if you're interested in sponsoring, please reach out to us. We have an amazing list of sponsors lined up already, and you'll want to be part of that when I start naming them constantly on this show for the next four months or so. And with that, let's jump right into that discussion with Yamini Sagar.
All right, we're joined by Yamini Sagar from InstaRails.
What motivated Yamini to found InstaRails and how did her background shape the company?
Thanks for joining us.
Thank you for having me, Reid. I'm so excited to be here today.
All right, well, I'm excited to have you because I think it's going to be a fun conversation, a bit of a departure because we haven't talked about cross-border on the show in a little while, so I'm excited to do that. But why don't we start off with an introduction, kind of tell our listeners about yourself, give us a sense for what InstaRails is doing and why that mission is so important to you.
So yeah, currently, even though I'm the founder and CEO of InstaRails, my journey began years ago when I first moved from India to the United States. I remember watching 15% almost of my hard-earned money disappear into fees and poor exchange rates while sending money back to my mom in India. This is money that she could have benefited from. Fast forward that even in 2022 before InstaRails, when paying vendors in India, they wouldn't receive the funds for 10 days despite the high fees I paid, causing them to lose trust in me. Today, with Instarills, these same vendors get paid in less than 15 minutes with near mid-market exchange rates, low fees, and the best part is I can track my payment just like a UPS package.
I had a true great decades of career working for prestigious companies like New York Stock Exchange, Bitpay, Bakkt and more. I have managed clearing and settlement risk across six continents for trillions of dollars, developed digital asset platforms, crypto payout products, and earned several patents along the way. And since I had a prestigious corporate career, my friends and family still think I'm crazy for walking away from that security.
How big is the global cross‑border payments market and which corridors and use cases dominate?
But as an experienced leader, I couldn't ignore what I knew was possible, right? So the gap of what could be built and what existed was too wide. So I invested my own savings and bootstrapped Instarills in the beginning before securing angel funding from some New York Stock Exchange executives who believed in our vision. And we have built a proprietary payment network delivering near instant global transactions across 150 countries in 70 plus currencies We have created an infrastructure that can empower mobile apps, businesses, and read the true financial backbones of local neighborhoods, which are community banks and credit unions. Why is this mission so important to me? It's because for me, as a single mom from a middle-class family,
I understand the value of financial independence and of every dollar and want to give that back to all the hardworking people in the world, right? So after two decades of experience in this space, I felt I had my calling to build Instagram as there's no greater joy than strengthening communities financially at scale.
Yeah, I think that's a huge focus, right? And I mean, the way you describe it, it's like the slow and expensive, that's not an ideal combination for payments.
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Chapters
8 chapters
1
What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
0:05–0:28
2
Who are Reed Luhtanen and Yamini Sagar and what is this episode about?
0:28–1:51
3
What motivated Yamini to found InstaRails and how did her background shape the company?
1:51–3:32
4
How big is the global cross‑border payments market and which corridors and use cases dominate?
3:32–4:52
5
What are the historical pain points in cross‑border payments (fees, speed, transparency)?
4:52–6:08
6
How does InstaRails' network and technology reduce cost, speed up transfers, and improve tracking?
6:08–7:18
7
How is InstaRails addressing inclusion, compliance, and disputes for banks and the unbanked?
7:18–10:45
8
What industry priorities, fraud challenges, and standards surfaced during the 'Buy or Sell' segment?
10:45–21:41
Speakers
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