Revolut Teams Up with Alipay for Payments to China

The UK’s fintech major Revolut on Tuesday said that it has teamed up with Ant International to let users around the world, especially overseas Chinese, send money to China in Chinese Yuan using Alipay.

Knowing the strong demand and high transfer volumes, Revolut said that transfers can be made using just the recipient’s Alipay ID, name, and address, which are processed instantly, the company said.

According to media reports, the service is powered by Ant International’s global remittance infrastructure and this feature supports growing demand for cross-border payments into China, which remained one of the world’s top five remittance destinations in 2024, receiving an estimated $48 billion.

Revolut offers a tiered fee structure for these transfers: Standard customers are charged 0.15% with a minimum fee of $4.62, premium customers pay 0.12% with a minimum of $3.69, and metal users get fee-free transfers.

The maximum fees are capped at $313.12 for Standard users and 250.50 for premium users, depending on the currency and destination.

The new offering adds to Revolut’s suite of global money transfer services, which includes Instant Card Transfers, bank transfers, mobile wallet transfers to services like bKash in Bangladesh and M-Pesa in Kenya, as well as free peer-to-peer transfers between Revolut users.

The company recently lowered its fees for sending money in the local currency of a recipient’s country, reducing the cost from 0.40% to 0.15% for standard users and from 0.20% to 0.12% for premium users.

Alipay, launched in 2004, is China’s most widely used payment app and is one of 36 e-wallets supported by Alipay+ under Ant International.

Revolut’s CEO for Singapore and Southeast Asia Raymond Ng said that they were thrilled to partner with Ant International, to enable Revolut’s 50 million customers globally to transfer money to China almost instantly via Alipay.

He said that China is one of the world’s largest remittance markets and they see strong demand from their customers for a secure and affordable way to send money there.

“Our partnership with Ant International underscores our commitment to providing fast, secure and cost-effective solutions for global money transfers, further empowering our customers to manage their finances conveniently across borders,” he said and added that they were grateful to collaborate with industry leaders like Revolut to redefine cross-border remittance experiences,” he said.

Jacques Xu, General Manager of Global Remittance Business, Ant International, said that through Ant International’s solutions, Revolut was enabling more partners to easily manage and grow their remittance business while meeting customers’ needs on speed and security.

Expanding Global Footprint

According to the media reports, Revolut is focusing on its aggressive global expansion. Last month, it agreed to acquire Banco Cetelem in Argentina from BNP Paribas, marking its first direct entry into the South American banking market.

It is also looking to expand its presence in Israel and is in talks with the Bank of Israel to acquire a “lean bank” licence in the country.

Revolut started as a challenger bank but received a banking licence in the country after years of delay.  It also obtained a banking licence in Mexico last year and already operates in the European Union with a Lithuanian banking licence.

It is further seeking a banking licence in New Zealand and plans to invest more than $1.1 billion in France, where it will apply for a French banking licence.