Wise Launches In Mexico to Tap $28 Billion Remittance Market

Cross-border payments provider Wise is continuing its Latin American expansion by launching in Mexico.

The London-based company announced in a news release Thursday (Jan. 30) that users will now be able to send money from Mexico to more than 160 countries in upwards of 40 currencies. It also allows Mexican nationals who live in the U.S. to send money back home.

Wise says these sorts of transfers account for the “third largest corridor” for its U.S. customers, with the volume of transfers on this route doubling over the past two years.

“Launching our services in Mexico is a continuation of our strong, consistent growth in North and Latin America,” Wise Chief Technology Officer Harsh Sinha said in the release. “Mexico, a region where consumers are loaded with unjust hidden fees, presents a strategic opportunity for Wise as it helps further our mission and opens a key currency route to bolster our business.”

The release notes that while Mexican consumers are projected to send close to $28 billion in remittances this year alone, those consumers lost $446 million last year when sending money overseas due to hidden fees.

“These fees can be buried in fine print, added last minute, or bundled with other costs like an exchange rate mark-up, making them hard to detect,” the release added.

The company notes that this launch marks its ongoing growth in the Americas, following Wise’s expansion into Brazil, where it has launched 2 million international multi-currency cards and seen the number of individual customers in Brazil grow by 94% in the last fiscal year.

Wise also recently began collaborating with digital banking giant Nubank in Brazil, with that company using Wise’s infrastructure to issue multi-currency accounts and debit cards.

As PYMNTS wrote last year, Latin America (LatAm) is proving to be a key target for FinTechs, given the region’s population of younger, digitally-savvy consumers, unbanked/underbanked populations and a “regulatory environment conducive to digital innovation.”

“Brazil stands out here as an example of LatAm’s appeal, given the fact that two-thirds of consumers own smartphones, the average sample age is 42, lower than the roughly 48 we estimated across 11 countries, and 39% are millennials, as compared to the overall average of 29%,” that report said.