October 2024: Top five payments stories of the month
October has witnessed several significant developments in the payments sector, including a string of new licenses and partnerships.
Here, we run through five of the top payment stories from October, featuring Online Payment Platform, Wise, Santander UK, and more.
Dutch paytech Online Payment Platform secures EMI licence in the UK
OPP secures UK EMI licence
Online Payment Platform (OPP), a Netherlands-based company providing a suite of payment capabilities to marketplaces and platforms across Europe, has secured an electronic money institution (EMI) licence from the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) in the UK.
OPP says it will leverage the new licence to expand its capabilities “to facilitate C2C, B2C and B2B payments for platforms and marketplaces in the UK”.
The company adds that the new licence “now allows OPP to offer a wallet solution” for businesses to help firms in both mainland Europe and the UK boost their cross-border payment capabilities and “navigate the complexities of international expansion”.
Founded in 2011 and launched two years later, OPP’s payments offering includes services such as multi-split payments, dispute handling, automated mediation and an escrow solution.
Kenya migrates national payment system to ISO 20022
The Central Bank of Kenya (CBK) has migrated the Kenya Electronic Payment and Settlement System (KEPSS) to ISO 20022, an international standard for electronic data interchange.
In a statement, the CBK says it predicts “significant benefits” arising from the migration, including “faster settlement times, streamlined processing and improved liquidity management”.
First introduced for financial institutions in 2004, ISO 20022 is a framework for developing messages used in various financial services with extensible markup language (XML), facilitating communication between different financial systems and institutions globally.
Swift gears up for 2025 live trials of digital asset transactions
Swift to trial transactions with digital assets
Swift is set to commence live trials of digital assets and currency transactions through its network from next year.
The proposed pilot transactions will enable financial institutions operating in North America, Europe and Asia to use Swift to transact interchangeably across both existing and emerging asset and currency types.
The trials will interlink various digital and traditional currency platforms with the network, providing what Swift describes as “a single system for banks to transact across borders with digital and fiat currencies and further aiding this new market to grow”.
“This marks a giant leap forward from our prior experimentation, with a deliberate focus on providing interlinking and orchestration capabilities that could support real-world solutions,” Swift says.
Wise joins Japan’s domestic payment network Zengin
Wise, a UK-based global money transfer firm, has been approved to join Japan’s domestic payment network Zengin
Once connected, Wise will be able to process real-time payments directly, without intermediaries, as the first non-bank addition to a network typically reserved for banks.
This will include facilitating instant cross-border payments to and from Japan for both individuals and businesses.
The approval follows closely on the heels of Wise’s Japanese arm, Payments Japan KK, reportedly being licenced to provide Type 1 Funds transfer services earlier this year.
Santander UK enters open banking payments partnership with Token.io
The two firms announced the new partnership at the Open Banking Expo in London
Santander UK, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Banco Santander, has partnered with payments firm Token.io to utilise its open banking connectivity and infrastructure.
The bank will leverage Token.io’s tech to enable customers to make direct account-to-account (A2A) payments from external bank accounts to repay credit cards.
According to Token.io, this repayment method “eliminates error-prone manual data entry and supports biometric Strong Customer Authentication (SCA) for payments made on mobile devices”.
Furthermore, Santander intends to use Token.io’s solutions to enhance “real-time money movement” for its more than 14 million active customers in the UK as it looks to develop new real-time payment propositions.
