Asia

The two-year old APASS has helped Alibaba persuade wealthier consumers to up their spending at Tmall and Taobao shopping emporiums.

India's abrupt recall of its larger bills — a bid to crack down on tax evasion — was a crash course in how to adapt to a cash shortage. Was this an opportunity for mobile payments or a failing of the overall financial services system?

Mastercard has launched its quick-response mobile payments system in India through its Masterpass mobile wallet, designed to help mobile banking users complete purchases through their mobile phones at the physical point of sale.

Major wholesalers at Delhi’s largest fruit and vegetable market, which serves most of the capital’s nearly 17 million people, are planning to sell their products at bargain prices in order to move perishable stock as the impact of India’s cash shortages continues to bite.

In ancient mythology, Chinese unicorns are lucky, rare creatures that appear to mark the arrival or death of a great leader, like Confucius. Today, China's tech unicorns -- private companies valued at $1 billion or more -- are far more commonplace and look increasingly cursed.

Temasek Holdings Pte pared its investment in Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. in the third quarter, as shares of China’s biggest online retailer rallied, while emerging as a shareholder of software maker Dell Technologies Inc.

The crisis sparked by the shortage of cash in India following Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s anti-graft measure to ban high-value currency bills has hit the movement of goods in Asia’s third-largest economy.

The reports at first seem striking: India's abrupt recall of its larger cash notes has caused a dramatic uptake in mobile payments, likely spurred by staggering lines at bank branches and ATMs.

Australia should follow India’s lead and scrap its biggest bank notes, UBS Group AG said.

Flywire, the Boston-based firm specializing in cross-border tuition payments, has expanded to Australia, the third most popular destination in the world for international education behind the U.S. and the U.K.