BBVA teams up with Ant Group’s blockchain platform for global trade
In efforts to push for faster payments, banks are looking for alternative rails to expand their reach as well as push its commercial payments market by collectively resolving SMEs and FIs problems in cross-border payments.
This week, Banco Bilbao Vizcaya Argentaria (BBVA) has announced that it has signed an agreement to collaborate on the integration of financial services on Chinese group Ant’s platform, Trusple which is based on blockchain technology.
The technology aims to accelerate the digital transformation and facilitate the financing of international trade operations, with a special focus on small and mid-sized businesses, as stated by the press release. The agreement signed with BBVA will allow banks to integrate cross-border payment and financing services in Trusple.
This year, BBVA launches commercial cards to simplify business spends in South America.
The services will be offered by BBVA Mexico and BBVA Spain and importers in these nations will be able to use these services and pay Chinese suppliers for their operations within Trusple, all without using any external platform.
Trusple is designed to resolve the problems that SMEs and financial institutions face when in cross-border trade. BBVA’s previous research on blockchain technology will allow us to incorporate new services in this platform fairly easily,” says Alejandro Cárdenas Bortoni, head of Commercial Banking at BBVA México.
BBVA in the press note said that the first piloting systems will be launched in early 2022 and the services will be operational for its clients in Spain and Mexico throughout the year and this agreement makes the bank the first bank in Spain and Mexico to join the international trade platform.
Trusple is a digital international trade platform for SMEs which is developed by Ant Group.