Uphold Inc., a platform that provides various financial services and encourages fintech innovation, now allows customers in Greater China and Hong Kong to use their China UnionPay card to load funds to their Uphold wallet. Uphold is partnering with China UnionPay, the largest bank card association in China. Uphold offers China UnionPay customers a safe, secure, and transparent suite of financial services.
In announcing the China UnionPay partnership, Anthony Watson, Uphold president and CEO, said Uphold becomes the first U.S.-based financial services company to provide services in Greater China and Hong Kong since the country opened its $7 trillion bank card market to foreign players on June 1, 2015.
China An Important Market
Greater China, the world’s second-largest economy, is one of Uphold’s most important markets, according to Watson. Watson stated on a blog that online transactions are booming in China, driven by hundreds of millions of smartphones in use for everything from paying for meals, taxis, and at high street stores.
There is a 3.8% fee to fund Uphold accounts with China UnionPay. Per transaction and daily transaction limits apply.
To open an Uphold account, China UnionPay customers need to present a Chinese passport or a Chinese national identification card.
The onboarding of funds to Uphold complies with Chinese state capital requirements and controls.
Uphold has a customer support page in Chinese.
Uphold Expansion Continues
In November, Uphold launched the ability for U.S. members to fund Uphold accounts by linking their bank accounts, debit or credit cards, in addition to bitcoin. The U.S. expansion marked the second phase of Uphold’s global growth, following an October rollout in Europe. Uphold noted on its website that this functionality connects the legacy and fragmented financial ecosystem with the “Internet of Money.”
Businesses, individuals, and charities can avoid costs by building products and services for their customers via Uphold’s open API, Uphold Connect. Uphold’s open API provides the documentation needed to create new applications and services powered by the Uphold platform.
Client libraries include Android SDK, PHP SDK, Python SDK and Ruby SDK.
Developers Are Welcome
The Uphold website says the company is seeking developers to contribute Uphold client libraries for various languages and platforms. Developers who have written a library can link to the Github repository so Uphold can promote it and collaborate on further development.
“With your ingenuity, together we can serve the needs of individuals and organizations across the globe and change the financial services ecosystem forever,” the company notes on its website.
In addition to direct bank access in the U.S. via ACH and across the European Union and the U.K. via Single Euro Payments Area (SEPA) and UK Faster Payments which Uphold already provides, innovators can now create applications, products and services that accept China UnionPay.
Uphold membership is free. Members can transfer with one another for free with no maximum obligation amounts or transaction volume restrictions.
More Innovation Coming
Uphold plans to release virtual and physical payment cards with Visa and MasterCard for members to pay merchants (online and in-store) from their Uphold accounts directly, CCNreported in October.
Featured image from Shutterstock.
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