The number of accounts opened on the RBI’s retail direct scheme (RDS) platform soared 82.5 per cent year-on-year (y-o-y) at 3,12,618, as of September 29, 2025, reflecting retail investors’ interest amid falling deposit rates and volatile stock markets.
As of September 30, 2024, the number of accounts opened on the RDS platform, which was launched in November 2021, stood at 1,71,269, according to RBI data.
Along with the jump in the number of accounts opened, primary market subscriptions in treasury bills, floating rate savings bonds, Central government dated securities, State government securities, and sovereign gold bonds via the platform, rose 37 per cent y-o-y to Rs7,302 crore, as of September 29, 2025 (from Rs5,329 crore).
Total traded volume (secondary market) in the aforementioned instruments shot up about 6.43 times to Rs5,293 crore (from Rs823 crore).
modern alternative
Venkatakrishnan Srinivasan, Founder and Managing Partner, Rockfort Fincap LLP, pointed out that most banks offer interest rates below 7 per cent on fixed deposits (FDs). Small savings schemes come with lock-in restrictions and limited flexibility. Venkatakrishnan emphasised that the RDS offers a modern alternative — combining sovereign safety, flexibility and attractive yields in a completely online format.
It gives investors access to these opportunities, which were earlier available only to institutional participants.
Further, given the volatile equity markets, investors are looking at safer fixed income investment options.
Venkatakrishnan noted that the RBI floating rate savings bonds offer 8.05 per cent, higher than most bank FDs, at least till December.
Similarly, 10-year State government securities (SGS) offer 7.2 per cent annualised yields. The sovereign-backed and tradeable instruments often provide a yield pick-up of 50-100 basis points over FDs.
When liquidity is tight or policy rates are high, T-bills can offer significantly better short-term yields than FDs of less than one year.
The number of registrations on RDS has more than doubled y-o-y to 5,30,815 as of September 29, 2025.