posted November 03, 2015 at 11:25 pm
by Julito G. Rada [
manilastandardtoday.com ]
Monday sent home by Filipinos working
overseas is expected to reach $36 billion by 2019 from $24 billion in 2014,
buoyed by increasing Internet usage and mobile connectivity.
Market research company Ken Research
said in a report mobile money and other mobile financial services would play a
vital role in the future expansion of the remittance market.
“Increasing Internet penetration and
mobile connectivity is improving access to remittance services as digital
offerings drive a decline in transaction fees,” the report said.
It said the bills payment market was
bolstered dramatically by growth in remittances and higher income of overseas
workers.
Remittances fuel private consumption and
one of the backbones of economic growth. In the first eight months of 2015,
cash remittances reached $16.206 billion, or 4.1 percent higher than $15.572
billion a year ago.
Personal remittances, which include
non-cash items, reached $17.933 billion in the first eight months, up 3.9
percent from $17.268 billion a year earlier.
Bangko Sentral earlier said the efforts
of banks and non-bank remittance service providers to expand their
international and domestic market coverage through their network of remittance
business partners worldwide provided support to the steady remittance flows.
Alix Murphy, senior mobile analyst at
WorldRemit, said the report of Ken Research reflected the huge role that mobile
technology was now playing in remittances to the Philippines.
“Mobile-based remittances can be a game
changer: by eliminating the need for cash and paper processes and the high
costs associated with them, mobile money will play an increasingly important
role in international money transfer,” Murphy said.
It was estimated that the cost of
sending remittances through mobile money was 4 percent, lower than the global
average of 8 percent to 9 percent.
“Filipinos are among the most digitally
connected when it comes to staying in touch with friends and family. Mobile
Internet penetration in the Philippines is the third highest in Southeast Asia,
behind only Thailand and Malaysia, with mobile Internet adoption reaching 62
percent of total subscribers in 2014,” Murphy said.
He said with just 28 percent of the
population having a bank account but over half the population owning a mobile
phone, mobile would be the first and only means of accessing financial services
for many Filipinos.
“Although mobile money has taken longer
to reach same levels of adoption as in other regions such as Africa and Latin
America, there are signs that’s now changing. One in 10 Filipinos have received
money via a mobile phone, according to the latest national financial inclusion
survey,” Murphy said.
He cited available data showing that as
of end-2014, there were 26.7 million mobile money accounts, handling around 217
million transactions and P716 billion ($15 billion) during the year.
Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas also cited
the important role of mobile money in its strategy to increase financial
inclusion, for which it was cited by the World Bank and other institutions.
Murphy said WorldRemit could be part of
this important transformation by serving Filipinos with low-cost instant
international money transfers directly from their smartphone to any bank,
cash-pick up agency or mobile money account.
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