Neo · · 28 min
Stablecoin Neobank for Asia: Tarun Mangukiya on KOSH, Freelancer USD Accounts & In-House Compliance
With 
Tarun Mangukiya
Key takeaways
Tarun Mangukiya says freelancers across Asia pay 3 to 5 percent, and sometimes up to 10 percent, to receive international payments, while Kosh Neobank charges a maximum of 50 basis points.
Tarun Mangukiya argues that compliance is the one layer a neobank should never outsource, and says Kosh scores each user with 20 to 30 social signals and AI agent workflows.
Kosh Neobank grew out of the Copperx payment gateway, now has a live consumer app, and wants to be a lifestyle product like Cash App.
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Summary
Tarun Mangukiya says Kosh can serve Asian freelancers more cheaply and reliably than others because it builds its own compliance tools instead of using vendors from the US and Europe.
Tarun Mangukiya says freelancers across Asia pay 3 to 5 percent, and in some cases up to 10 percent, just to receive payments from international clients. His stablecoin neobank, Kosh Neobank, charges a maximum of 50 basis points. He says the consumer app is now live.
A reliability problem
Tarun Mangukiya says the problem goes beyond fees. In his account, existing neobanks in the region change their policies every few months because they cannot manage the compliance risk, which creates "a cycle of broken trust that leaves freelancers stranded." For a company based in the US or Europe, he says, Asia is only one market among several: "the moment you start seeing high risk," it cuts off the region. Infrastructure providers such as MoonPay and Iron offer USD accounts "pretty easily," he notes, but he says they lack local risk management for Asia.
“People like, they're I I talked to many folks, and they are like, you know, like, payments are payment apps are fundamentally boring. Right? Like, I mean, why would you keep opening your payment app every single day?”
Tarun MangukiyaCompliance built in-house
Tarun Mangukiya says most compliance tools "fail in the region" because the APIs or the data are not available. Kosh Neobank is instead building custom compliance tools native to the region "with lot of AI automations." Every wallet runs on a smart account the team built, and the compliance layer is entirely in-house. It builds freelancer profiles from 20 to 30 social scoring signals, with agents put to work on each profile from onboarding. Asked which layer a neobank should never outsource, he answered: "Compliance."
From gateway to neobank
Copperx started in 2022 as a crypto payment gateway that competed directly with Coinbase Commerce. Tarun Mangukiya says it already gave every checkout its own deposit address that could be reconciled across any chain. That technology now runs under the hood of Kosh Neobank, including its smart account wallets and invoicing. After the rebrand, the company stopped marketing its business accounts to focus on consumers.
A lifestyle product
Tarun Mangukiya says he wants Kosh to be "a product like Cash App" for individuals and small businesses in Asia. He calls payment apps "fundamentally boring" and argues that cards and payments should be treated as lifestyle products. He says growth will be led by marketing rather than a sales funnel, with two to three consumer campaigns planned, most of them not on X.
Tarun Mangukiya says neobanks hold only 3% of global payment volume and calls this "a massive opportunity." His bet is that owning compliance will let Kosh Neobank stay in Asian markets where others have pulled back.
Copperx, Cash App, CipherOwl, and Axle come up most.
- People
- Tarun Mangukiya
- Dalpar
- Drew Rogers
- Companies
- Copperx
- Cash App
- CipherOwl
- Axle
- Coinbase
- Stripe
- Wealthfront
- Revolut Ltd
- Iron (by Moonpay)
- Dfns
- Square
- Wise
