Asia

The 2019 outlook for China’s cross-border e-commerce sector remains positive due to strong consumer demand, favorable regulations and tech-savvy shoppers’ interest in convenient mobile pay options, writes Franklin Chu, managing director for Azoya USA.

India has tightened rules regarding how foreign e-commerce platforms are allowed to sell goods in one of the fastest growing online markets, a potential blow to companies like Amazon.com Inc. and Walmart Inc.’s Flipkart.

China's Ant Financial, the Alibaba payments affiliate that operates Alipay, is reportedly in the advanced stages of talks to buy WorldFirst, an international payments provider based in London.

Facebook’s payments ambitions have made banks wary for years, despite many false starts. But now it looks as if Facebook is pivoting to develop a remittance business, starting with a cryptocurrency project in India.

The ubiquity of plastic payment cards makes it hard to imagine a future without them, but Japan’s JCB card network already envisions it.

Neither Amazon nor Starbucks could be described as a traditional retailer. But they both use their shared headquarters city as a playground for developing digital and in-store innovations that all merchants and payment companies will have to respond to the years ahead.

PayPay, a mobile payments company backed by SoftBank Group Corp., Yahoo Japan Corp. and India’s largest digital-payments company Paytm, said it’s updating its app to strengthen security after multiple complaints from users of wrongful charges.

The People’s Bank of China, the country’s central bank, plans to introduce a digital currency of its own. But unlike the decentralized blockchain-based offerings, this one could give Beijing more control over its financial system.

Ripple's cross-border payments engine is gaining share in India, where it's partnering with Currencies Direct to deliver real-time remittances through Ripple's xCurrent payment protocol.

Japanese credit card brand JCB has signed several deals to expand its global acceptance online and at the point of sale.