Visa, Currencycloud Team For X-Border, Travel Payments

Visa and Currencycloud, an enterprise-class payments platform, announced on Tuesday (June 4) a partnership to drive more innovation in cross-border and travel payments.

In a press release, the two companies said the agreement meshes with Visa’s stated goal to make secure digital payments possible at home and when people are traveling. Under the agreement, Visa’s customers and banking and FinTech partners will have the option to use Currencycloud’s cloud-based payments platform to provide in-demand services, including multi-currency wallets and real-time notifications on foreign exchange transactions. It will also offer customers the ability to better manage travel abroad via improved visibility and control of money.

“Today, one in five payments is a cross-border transaction, whether that’s from a consumer traveling internationally or buying from an international seller online,” Charlotte Hogg, CEO, Europe, Visa. “Our goal is to continue to help our clients meet this increasing demand for slick, simple and more convenient cross-border payments and make it easier for Visa cardholders to manage their money when traveling. Our partnership with Currencycloud will empower our clients to do just that by offering an innovative, competitive, digital-first solution that ultimately gives consumers and cardholders more control over digital payments – at home and abroad.”

According to Visa and Currencycloud, the market for international payments is in growth mode, with cross-border eCommerce expected to reach $900 billion in value by 2020. It will account for more than a fifth of the global eCommerce market. The two said they will focus on providing solutions that remove barriers to how, where and when consumers can pay internationally.

The initial focus of the partnership is on Currencycloud’s platform, which enables pre-purchase of travel currency and/or real-time notifications of FX rates when cardholders use Visa outside their home country.

“Currencycloud exists to take the complexity out of international payments,” stated Mike Laven, CEO of Currencycloud. “Banks are under pressure to provide better user experiences in an increasingly connected world, and our partnership with Visa will enable us to deliver that on a grand scale. Our leading APIs give control and visibility of international transactions; that power, combined with the reach of Visa, will enable a new generation of consumers to benefit from a better experience when spending abroad.”