In the past, remittances abroad took as little as three days and as long as one week, and fees were deducted at various levels.
Nowadays, with the help of blockchain technology, remittances only take a few minutes, arrive quickly and have low fees.
This cross-border payment revolution is changing the remittance habits of hundreds of millions of people.
There are three major pain points in traditional cross-border remittances.
First, it is slow, usually taking 3 to 5 working days, or even a week; second, it is expensive, with the handling fee plus intermediary bank deductions usually costing 10 to 30 US dollars; third, it is opaque, and the remitter does not know where the money is.
The annual global cross-border remittance amount exceeds US$700 billion, and the cumulative handling fees exceed US$10 billion. These are the hard-earned money of remitters.
The essence of blockchain is a decentralized distributed ledger that cannot be tampered with and is fully traceable.
When applied to cross-border remittances, it has the advantage of real-time arrival and can bypass SWIFT’s layers of clearing; it can reduce fees and intermediary bank deductions; it is also transparent and can be traced, and every transaction can be traced.
Its core advantages include point-to-point, from the remitter to the payee without the need for multiple intermediary banks; 7×24 hours without restrictions on bank working hours; every step is recorded.
There are many players in the field of cross-border payments.
Ripple is the world’s largest blockchain cross-border payment network, processing cross-border payments in more than 50 countries and 70 currencies. It cooperates with Bank of America, Santander, Standard Chartered Bank, etc., and claims to process more than 15,000 transactions per second.
For example, the Brazilian mobile payment company enabled Ripple, shortening the cross-border remittance time from 3-5 days to a few minutes; Japan’s SBI Ripple Asia cooperated with the Bank of Thailand to realize instant remittances between Japan and South Korea.
WorldCoin is a cryptocurrency project founded by the Soros Foundation. Its goal is to make cross-border remittances as easy as sending an email. It is supported by more than 150 countries and will accelerate global expansion in 2025. It has millions of users and a monthly processing amount of billions of dollars.
Chinese players also performed well.
Ant Chain cooperates with GCash in the Philippines to realize cross-border real-time remittance services for millions of overseas workers; the Central Bank Digital Currency (DCEP) conducts cross-border payment pilot exploration to realize wallet interoperability between Hong Kong and Macau; UnionPay International cooperates with blockchain companies to launch cross-border fast payment products.
Blockchain has multiple specific application scenarios in cross-border payments.
Regarding overseas workers’ remittances, there are more than 250 million overseas workers in the world, and they remit more than 500 billion U.S. dollars to their hometowns every year. Traditional remittances take several days to their hometowns and have high handling fees. However, through blockchain, the remittances can arrive in a matter of minutes and the handling fees are reduced by 50% – 80%. For example, Filipino workers can receive remittances from the United States in just a few seconds.
In terms of cross-border e-commerce settlement, traditional cross-border e-commerce has long payment collection cycles and high fees. Blockchain can achieve real-time payment and reduce settlement costs. For example, Shopify merchants can receive payment within a few hours through blockchain collection.
When paying fees for studying abroad, traditional methods have high handling fees and slow arrival. Blockchain can allow tuition fees to be transferred directly to the school account, shortening the time from days to minutes.
Compared with traditional remittances, blockchain remittances have obvious advantages.
The arrival time is shortened from 3 to 5 days to a few minutes, the handling fee is reduced from 10 to 30 US dollars to 1 to 5 US dollars, and the service time is changed from working days to 7×24 hours, and the entire process can be checked.
However, cross-border remittances on the blockchain also face some challenges, such as compliance risks, as each country has different regulatory policies on cryptocurrency; anti-money laundering (AML) compliance requirements; traditional financial institutions have limited trust in the blockchain; user education takes time; and technical risks, such as blockchain network congestion, smart contract vulnerabilities, etc.
Blockchain cross-border payments have the following development trends in 2025: Compliance is accelerating, more countries have introduced blockchain payment regulatory frameworks, and traditional banks are accelerating their layout; integration with traditional finance, SWIFT explores blockchain integration, and banks cooperate with blockchain companies; scenarios are diversified, extending from remittances to trade settlement and investment; central bank digital currency cross-border payments, RMB digital currency cross-border pilots are expanded, and central bank digital currencies of many countries are interconnected.
For ordinary people, if they need cross-border remittance, they can compare the fees of traditional channels and blockchain channels, choose a formal licensed institution, and conduct a small investment test first.
If you want to invest, you can pay attention to blockchain payment concept stocks, but investing in cryptocurrency is risky.
In short, although blockchain cross-border remittances will not “surge and plummet” like Bitcoin, it is quietly changing the pattern of cross-border payments, bringing a faster and cheaper remittance experience to overseas workers, cross-border e-commerce sellers, parents of international students, etc.
