Asia

While interest from the West has so far been tepid in the region, this is an opportune time for fintech investors to look at participation in the Southeast Asian market, writes Alexander Koles, CEO and founder of Evolve Capital Partners.

China's central bank has put the brakes on mobile and e-commerce payment schemes in the past, mostly from the standpoint of having a wary eye on third-party players elbowing their way into financial services.

China's Ant Financial Group, the company behind Alipay, was among eight companies that EMV standards governing body EMVCo has named as technical associates to its secure-payment consortium.

Alipay is chasing Chinese tourists to Japan, where it’s signing up a growing number of retailers and eyeing the long-term potential of the nation’s $45 billion digital payments market.

TransferTo and Cellum, a leading international mobile wallet provider, have formed a strategic partnership enabling Cellum to expand its services by leveraging TransferTo’s cross-border payments network.

Global testing laboratory FIME is opening its first office in China to meet demand for Chinese payment vendors expanding globally.

India’s income tax officials are investigating transactions at various illegal bitcoin exchanges, a week after the country’s central bank cautioned users of the virtual currency about potential risks.

Almost 10,000 merchants in Hong Kong and Macau will offer discounts throughout December to Alipay users from Mainland China. Merchants in India, Thailand, and other markets will also participate.

One of the world's largest bitcoin exchanges, bitFlyer, has landed in the U.S. with a focus on institutional investors — a move that suggests bitcoin's days as a payments instrument are still a long way off.

Paytm Payments Bank is targeting to become the world’s largest digital bank with 500 million bank accounts and aims to turn into an integrated financial services company that offers everything from wealth management to share trading.