Money Transfers Newsletter, December 2007
“In the UK, according to our best estimates, around £2.3bn worth of remittances are made each year. The money transfer sector is growing rapidly. Already we have almost 4000 money transfer business operating out of almost 30,000 premises. A transparent and robust system for overseas money transfers is crucial and we need the market to work as effectively as possible.”
Western Union continues to be the market leader in the money transfer market, with around 14% of the global market. David Schlapbach, General Counsel and Executive Vice President of Western Union, took the industry perspective to the regulators in his speech at the 3rd Global Consumer Money Transfer Conference held in London last month. Editor Meena Kansal spoke to him afterwards to get his view point on other important issues surrounding Western Union's business in the sector.
Nick Ford, Head of Payments, CapGemini, explains the third World Payments Report in its view of the future of the money transfer industry in Europe and globally.
Says Nick Ford, “The essence of the report is that there is going to be a complete change in the payments market within Europe. That change will be heavily affected by additional services, new markets and the entry of more international players both within and outside the European arena.
Russia was well-represented at the conference and indeed, there is much interest from the money transfer industry in this rapidly growing region. Industry, regulators, investors and analysts presented their diverse viewpoints to create dimensional picture of the Russian remittance market. A large country with a steady stream of immigrants, particularly from the surrounding CIS countries, Russia is a significant sender of remittances into Central Asia, Eastern Europe, China and other regions.
IAMTN has decided to respond to a very real need for a global payments database which is correct, detailed and available covering every corner of the world. All sectors of the payments industry will be included; namely money service businesses, their agents, banks and their agents/links, pre-payment cards, mobile phone companies who transmit payments; regulators and service providers. It will include authoritative analyst's reports, merger details, legal entity information, etc.
“We are creating a very sophisticated platform to run our remittance products on.” Jack Jared, Head of Global Payments, Citigroup, talks about the company's increasing interest in the money transfer market.
Q: What are Citigroup's targets in the money transfer market? What do you hope to achieve?
Subscribe to IAMTN Newsletter
YES - I would like to know more about IAMTN actvities
Privacy by SafeSubscribe
6.03 Exchange Tower, One Harbour Exchange Square, London E14 9GE, UK
+44 020 7531 1347 | info@iamtn.org
