China’s Ant Financial, an affiliate of Alibaba, is continuing its acquisition spree by purchasing stakes two digital payments firms, including South Korea’s Kakao Pay and the Philippines’ Mynt.
Alipay, Ant’s digital payment service, invested $200 million in Kakao Corp.’s Kakao Pay, a popular South Korean social media portal enabling digital payments, according to Reuters. The move will streamline the payment process for South Koreans shopping on Alibaba.
This month Ant also took a “substantial minority” interest in Mynt, a financial technology company operated by Philippines-based Globe Telecom, which announced the deal on its website Feb. 17.
Ant, which has agreed to buy MoneyGram International for $880 million, recently announced it’s raising $3 billion to fund various acquisitions.
An employee scans a quick response (QR) code displayed on the Ant Financial Services Group's Alipay app, an affiliate of Alibaba Group Holding Ltd., inside a Sa Sa International Holdings Ltd. store in an arranged photograph in Hong Kong, China, on Tuesday, Nov. 1, 2016. The urgency to prepare regulatory environments for fintech is growing as banks begin offering digital services such as biometric authentication and as mobile-payment systems such as Apple Pay and AliPay are introduced around the region. Photographer: Anthony Kwan/Bloomberg
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Bankers face a "critical limitation" due to the vast number of oversight agencies and institutions, like social media companies and telecom institutions, that a fraudster might touch on their way to scam a consumer.
The payments company has used an acquisition of digital asset firm Bridge to gain ground, reminiscent of how fintechs have honed in on banks' payment turf for years.
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