Comment by notpushkin
2 months ago
> AFAIK some places already have it, like Thailand and Malaysia.
Also Vietnam (Napas247), Singapore (PayNow), Philippines (QR Ph), Japan (lots different systems), China (WeChat/Alipay, I think?), Russia (SBP), Belarus (ERIP, in a sense), and the whole of EU (SEPA transfers).
One problem is, most of them don’t really work for you if you’re a foreigner. Moreta (YC S24) is doing something in SEA, and I’ve seen another service for visitors in India, but I think exchange rates wouldn’t be too good (compared to something like Wise, maybe on par with regular banks though).
https://moretapay.com/, https://ale.sh/r/moreta (affiliate link)
https://wise.com/, https://ale.sh/r/wise (affiliate link)
The EU is also now pushing WERO
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wero_(payment)
That's a commercial service backed by some European banks. It's not at all comparable with a non-profit service like Brazil's Pix.
The closest EU equivalent would probably be the planned digital euro, but the banks are fighting tooth and nail to prevent that.
Not only that - ECB, EU Comission / Council also supporting it.
Though, most of the shares belong to major EU banks, yes.
Isn't that (and its predecessor iDEAL) basically a layer on top of SEPA transfers though? (not that that's a bad thing)
Kind of, but with easier UX - because a SEPA transfer, which is free and instantaneous, still requires the sharing of a bank account number, while Wero works with QR codes, phone numbers, etc. They're also planning to expand it to NFC payments and online payments.
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India has UPI (Universal Payment Interface) for instant free transfers. They are working with Singapore to integrate their payment systems so that people will be able to send remittances instantly across the countries.
Yeah, and some of SEA payment modes already do cross-accept each other actually.