Brazilian FinTech EBANX Expanding Payments Across Central America

Brazilian FinTech startup EBANX has expansion plans for its payments operation across Central America and is kicking off operations in Costa Rica, with plans to launch in El Salvador, Panama, Guatemala and the Dominican Republic in the first half of 2021.

André Boaventura, chief marketing officer at EBANX, said in a press release emailed to PYMNTS on Friday (March 19) that Central America is a fast-growing region for online shopping and digital payments, with “great unknown potential for global companies.”

Boaventura added that with EBANX in the region, the companies can grow “their addressable market, but will also have a positive impact by expanding this population’s access to digital products and services.”

The FinTech is also expanding across South America and is planning a launch in Paraguay. EBANX does business in 15 Latin American countries and is among the fastest-growing digital commerce markets in the world, per the press release.

In South America, EBANX reaches a market of over 500 million people. “More and more, EBANX is helping global companies to seize Latin America’s full potential,” Boaventura said.

EBANX was founded by Alphonse Voigt, João Del Valle and Wagner Ruiz in 2012, and three years later started expanding beyond its home base of Brazil to introduce its payments tools to Mexico and Peru. The company later rolled out in Colombia, Chile, Argentina, Ecuador, Bolivia and Uruguay.

The company anticipates that its Central American expansion is worth about $12 billion in future eCommerce sales. Costa Rica was the first market in Central America for EBANX, and so far, the company has led the region in eCommerce.

With an internet penetration topping 80 percent, Costa Rica also has a high level of financial education and inclusion. Some 70 percent of the country is banked, according to World Bank data, and 27 percent are online consumers, EBANX said in the press release.

EBANX launched a digital wallet pilot last year — EBANX Go — with 10,000 invitation-only consumers. The company also partnered with Visa six months ago in an expanded collaboration for payment services in Brazil. EBANX also teamed up with Uber in November 2020 to be the exclusive payments processor for PIX, the instant payment network overseen by the Central Bank of Brazil.