The industry has grown rapidly in the last two years. There has been significant regional expansion and companies are adding bank services to their portfolio.
The fintech race has already begun. According to the industry leaders, who offer financial services by means of technology, we are now entering the stage of resistance and management.
The apps used to send and receive money from and to different countries are among the companies that achieved the most significant growth in the industry. Companies operating in this market are trying to expand with new investments and strategic alliances.
In the case of Remitee, international transactions increased by 300% and phone top-ups from Argentina to other countries, by 400%. Currently, the company is expanding into Spain, where it expects to have 500,000 customers in the short term.
“In the first years, we focused on expanding our services into 16 countries. However, when we offered our services in Argentina, we realized that unbanked or underbanked sellers, self-employed workers and service providers saw Remitee as an opportunity to make and receive payments at prices much lower than those charged by other providers of the service,” says Nicolás Zamudio, CFO and co-founder of Remitee. “We also noticed that people from Argentina and other countries who live abroad need to send money to Argentina,” he adds.
XCOOP —a fintech company that also operates in the remittance industry in Latin America— has just signed a collaboration agreement with SmartCard Marketing Systems, a company listed on both the Toronto Stock Exchange and the New York Stock Exchange. This collaboration will allow XCOOP to expand into the United States and China. The aim is to develop cloud and mobile banking apps for individuals and businesses.
“As a result of this alliance, SmartCard will get into the Latin American market while it will offer access to XCOOP to the millions of Latin Americans living and working in the US, who are eager to find new ways of sending money to their families,” says XCOOP’s team, which is led by Alex Torriglia. In addition, prices are expected to be lower than those of its competitors.
“People are attracted to XCOOP because of its international transaction services. However, once they become users, they will discover a complete neobank service that will help unbanked people access the modern banking world, which will enable them to have credit and debit cards, make bill payments and raise their credit rating,” says XCOOP’s team.
Within the industry, people believe that the digital transformation and the speed at which companies and people are adapting need to be accompanied by dynamic solutions and brokers.
Geopagos’s team, for example, says that the startup has grown exponentially in the last three years with investments of USD 25 million to expand into Latin America.
Geopagos operates in 16 countries in the region and has six offices. It makes more than 100 million transactions annually and has processed USD 3.5 billion so far. Some of his partners are key players in the industry, for example, Getnet, BacCredomatic, Banco Azteca, Ualá, NaranjaX, BancoEstado from Chile and Datafast.
“We want to take advantage of the existing market conditions in Latin America to boost financial digitization, accelerate the introduction of mobile payments and encourage their acceptance, and promote financial inclusion by means of our products,” says Sebastián Núñez Castro, CEO of Geopagos.
“In the context we live in, innovative payment alternatives such as contactless payments, QR codes and digital wallets play a major role in providing added value through real solutions that avoid the need to carry cash,” he adds.