However, payment experts say that disrupting today’s global banking patterns may not be nearly as easy to dislodge as the traditional long-distance telephone system proved to be. The individuals sending their money home pay an average fee of more than 8% of the total deposit to move cash from country A to country B–not including a pricey exchange rate-making the industry seem as ripe for a shake up as pre-Skype long-distance calling. Migrant workers’ remittances to the developing world alone amounted to more than $400 billion in 2013, according to World Bank data.
The two are right to smell an opportunity. TransferWise, a start-up that offers a low-cost way for consumers to exchange currency, recently raised $25 million, bringing it one step closer to convincing consumers and investors that it really will become “the Skype of money”, as it bills itself–particularly as the London start-up counts as its latest investor Sir Richard Branson, the British entrepreneur behind the Virgin conglomerate, and Peter Thiel, co-founder of PayPal.
0 kommentar(er)
