SINGAPORE -- 24 October 2018 - UNPay and Tencent Research Institute have jointly published the first of a series of white papers on the payment landscape focusing on Southeast Asia. 

 

Dubbed "The Venturing Out" series, the first paper centred on the Singapore market, was developed to help Chinese payment companies looking to venture overseas, have a better understanding of the local regulations and policies.

 

As the fourth largest international financial hub after New York, London and Hong Kong, Singapore has an established payment infrastructure and a comprehensive payment regulatory framework. 

 

To gain a deeper understanding of Singapore's payment market, the research teams from UNPay and Tencent, put together a detailed outline of the country's regulatory framework, structure and policies.

 

While the use of e-payments has been rising steadily over the past few years, interoperability among the myriad of e-payments methods has been a growing concern in Singapore. 

 

To overcome this issue, a taskforce was set up to develop a common QR code for the nation. In the country's push for a cashless society, the inclusion of electronic payment was even set as one of the five strategic pillars in its Smart Nation initiative. 

 

The common QR code, also known as the SGQR code was officially launched on 17 September this year, becoming the world's first unified universal payment QR code.

 

While Singapore's mobile internet infrastructure is well developed, with a high digital literacy, this digital awareness has not translated into actual usage of e-payment methods. According to the white paper, it has been found that traditional payment methods such as cash and checks are still common in small transactions in Singapore. 

 

Among the commonly used payment methods, cash is ranked second only to the stored value instrument (SVF). However, with strong support from the government and the industry players, there is a lot of room for development in  Singapore's emerging payment market.

 

Based on statistics from market research and business intelligence portal, Statista, the number of e-payment users in Singapore will reach 4.6 million in 2018, which accounts for more than 80% of Singapore's total population. The total transaction volume will reach 11.777 billion US dollars, with a total transaction volume of 12.4%. The average annual compound growth rate is expected to increase to a total of 18.796 billion US dollars in 2022.

 

With these data, it is clear that the global payment market is developing rapidly; innovations in payment are also emerging in droves. China's payment companies which have been been spearheading the fintech revolution, are now actively looking to bring their payment solutions overseas. "Venturing Out"  has thus become the new normal, paving the way for these Chinese payment companies to maintain their lead globally.

 

 "Currently, China's payment industry has become one of the most active payment forces in the world, and is more capable than ever to lead in international arenas," expressed Mr Zhang Zhenghua, Founder and CEO of UNPay, who was also the research project consultant.

 

"As a fintech open service platform, UNPay aims to make advanced payment technology available globally. We strive to open up payment capabilities, the global payment industry chain, as well as empower finanical institutions. In the coming months, we will be releasing our white paper on the payment industry in another country. Please stay tuned for that!" added Mr Zhang. (mor/*).