Rakbank enters partnership for Philippines payments corridor

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Daniel Webber
Daniel Webber
Founder & CEO
Daniel is Founder and CEO and has 20 years of experience in the international finance world focusing on cross-border payments, technology and the property sectors. Daniel is widely quoted as an expert… Read more
  • RAKBANK will work alongside BDO Unibank as part of a commitment to enhanced remittance services in the Philippines, which is one of the world’s largest cross border payments markets
  • Expats will be the primary customer segment targeted by the new move, which will involve blockchain-powered service RippleNet
  • “We, at RAKBANK are committed to increasing our international remittance footprint and are delighted to enhance our RMT services into the Philippines, thanks to our partnership with BDO”, said RAKBANK’s CEO

A leading bank in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) has confirmed that it will work alongside a bank in the Philippines to add value to its remittances offer there.

RAKBANK, which offers both commercial and consumer-focused banking services, said that it would work alongside BDO Unibank as part of the new plans.

The collaboration will see the bank use RippleNet, which it joined three years ago as part of a foray into the Indian market.

RippleNet is a blockchain-powered liquidity service which enables financial institutions to offer speedier and more efficient online money transfers.

As part of the new collaboration, cash transfers will be able to be made right away – meaning more efficiency for recipients of the money.

Customers will be able to make the transactions using RMT, which is the term given to RAKBANK’s transfer services.

It is understood that the primary market segment which the new collaboration intends to target are expats from the Philippines who are working abroad in the UAE.

In a statement to the press, Peter England – who serves as chief executive officer of RAKBANK – said that the firm was “delighted” about the development.

“We, at RAKBANK are committed to increasing our international remittance footprint and are delighted to enhance our RMT services into the Philippines, thanks to our partnership with BDO”, he said.

He added that the new service would have a fee structure that was in several ways cost-effective to clients.

“This partnership aims to offer the Filipino expat community here in the UAE the ability to safely and instantly remit money back home at competitive rates with zero back-end charges and no hidden fees”, he explained.

The move comes after Ripple, which operates RippleNet, released a report which looked at the state of the online money transfer sector in the region.

It claimed that in 2018, that there was a record high amount of cash going to low-income and middle-income countries in the Asia-Pacific region.

In total, it is believed that the figure was around $529bn in 2018.

This was expected to rise in 2019 and go up to $550bn in total.

Figures also show that the Philippines has the third-biggest remittance receipt market of any country in the world.

If you’re on the hunt for more information about the cross border payments sector, you don’t need to look any further than our news pages which you can find here.


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