The ₹100 Loan: What Really Happens When You Tap Your Credit Card
Details
Every time you tap your credit card, your bank is making you a loan - instantly deciding whether to lend you money, how much risk you pose, and what the transaction is worth to them. But what actually happens in those two seconds between your tap and 'Approved'? And what continues to happen over the next 72 hours before anyone actually gets paid? We'll follow a single ₹100 chai purchase through the entire lifecycle of a credit card transaction - from authorization to settlement - revealing the hidden world of instant lending, distributed trust, and the philosophical questions embedded in modern payment systems.
As always, we'll use thought experiments, unique mental models and real world examples to understand this process from the first principles.
If you enjoy learning by reasoning from first principles, questioning assumptions, and occasionally saying “ohhh, that’s why,” this one’s for you.
Who should attend
- Product Managers building fintech products
- Programmers working on fintech systems
- Anyone curious about how financial trust really works
You’ll walk away with clear mental models you can directly apply to real fintech problem statements.
Agenda
- Mental Models, First Principles Discussion around Credit Card Transactions – Soham (60 mins)
- Networking & Conversations (30 mins)
Speaker (In his own words)
I'm Soham, I’m from pune, I went to IIT Jodhpur, did my btech in cse there, I love cats and anime, and anything that makes me curious, I was working at a startup called glomopay which is a crossborder payments company that is where I gathered the curiosity for how money moves in systems. Right now I work at Clarisights, its a company that has a product for performance marketers.