Chinese payment system UnionPay International, the world’s biggest payment system both in terms of cards issued and volume of operations, is entering the Ukrainian market, the National Bank of Ukraine (NBU) announced on Nov. 13.
UnionPay International will provide services in Ukraine for issuing cash from ATMs and supporting payments for goods and services with UnionPay payment cards.
As reported by Ukrainian financial news website FinClub, this is the third attempt by the Chinese payment system to enter the Ukrainian market. There were previous, failed attempts to allow Chinese tourists to use their payment cards in Ukraine using PrivatBank terminals.
UnionPay will issue its first cards in Ukraine in around 5-6 months, the company says.
Japanese JSB is also in the running. According to the NBU, Takashi Suetsugu, chief executive at JCB’s international branch, said he will soon submit to the central bank all the needed documents to launch the company’s operations in Ukraine.
NBU head Yakiv Smoly, in turn, said he supported JCB’s plans. A new player could increase competition. The Ukrainian market of financial services is currently dominated by Visa and Mastercard, which carried out 1.5 billion cashless transactions worth $21 billion in the first half of 2018.
China’s UnionPay comes to Ukraine, Japan’s JCB eyes local marketRead More