On April 23, cross-border payment concept stocks in the A-share market continued to strengthen collectively, among which Qingdao King King and Hailian Jinhui had three consecutive boards, and Xinchen Technology had two consecutive boards.
In terms of news, multiple departments recently jointly issued the “Shanghai International Financial Center Action Plan to Further Improve Cross-Border Financial Services Facilitation”, which pointed out that it is necessary to improve the functions and global network coverage of the RMB Cross-border Payment System (CIPS), promote more banks to join CIPS, and continue to expand the coverage of the CIPS network, which will directly increase the volume of cross-border payment business.
In the current complex and ever-changing foreign trade situation, cross-border payment, as an important support for international trade, is facing unprecedented challenges and opportunities.
As the global economic landscape adjusts, trade policy uncertainty increases, and digital transformation accelerates, cross-border payments are also standing at a critical crossroads.
With the rapid development of the global Internet and the deep integration of international trade, cross-border e-commerce has become a new driving force in the foreign trade industry.
However, while cross-border e-commerce merchants are enjoying the dividends of market expansion, they still face many growth pain points and problems in payment.
Especially in the context of the United States’ abusive tariff policy, which changes frequently and rapidly, cross-border payments are facing multiple changes.
On the goods trade side, Yong Chengxiang, chairman of the Dongguan Industry and Trade Development Promotion Association and chairman of Dongguan Foaiwa Crafts Co., Ltd., said that in recent years, thanks to the dual blessings of trade globalization and online transactions, the import and export business has developed rapidly, followed by the increasing demand for international payment and exchange services from import and export companies.
“In the context of the rapid development of foreign trade and the complex trade background, import and export companies are faced with various problems such as exchange rate losses, foreign exchange limits, slow arrivals, slow cash withdrawals and frozen cards caused by non-compliant capital channels during the process of fund collection and payment. Payment has become an important factor restricting the development of import and export companies.” Yong Chengxiang said.
In terms of service trade, Gu Yue, deputy general manager of Bay Area tourism brands, believes that currently, aviation and travel companies represented by airlines, hotels, online travel providers (OTA platforms), etc. are accelerating their global layout.
However, there are still many pain points in air travel payment, including the cumbersome application process and low efficiency of traditional payment methods, large exchange rate fluctuations, and difficulty in ensuring the security of funds.
The problem of cross-border payment on the logistics side is even more prominent.
“Due to the long international logistics transportation chain, many operations and distribution links, coupled with the huge differences in the logistics environment between countries and the increasing fragmentation of foreign trade orders, in the process of digital transformation and global expansion, many logistics companies face many pain points such as multi-payment docking, difficulty in fund collection, low efficiency of reconciliation and account sharing, and complex fund allocation operations.” said Zhong Chenghui, sales manager of Huaxia Logistics Shenzhen Branch.
In general, cross-border payments are still facing the “triangular balance” challenge of compliance, cost and efficiency.
Lianlian International CEO Shen Enguang told reporters that under the background of the current global trade order being greatly disrupted, the complexity and cost of logistics payments for overseas companies may increase.
In addition, global regulations have become stricter and corporate compliance costs have increased significantly. These require the support of payment institutions to meet the challenges.
Despite facing many challenges, the cross-border payment industry has also ushered in unprecedented development opportunities.
Statistics show that the global cross-border payment market will reach US$240 million in 2024, a year-on-year increase of 12%.
In the same year, the market size of China’s cross-border digital payment service industry reached 7.5 trillion yuan.
In recent years, regulatory authorities have continued to emphasize the key role of new trade forms such as cross-border e-commerce in stabilizing foreign trade, and actively support cross-border e-commerce companies in developing cross-border payment services.
With the expansion of global trade and the globalization of e-commerce, there are huge business opportunities in the cross-border payment market.
He Dongdong, financial director of Leneng Innovation Technology Co., Ltd., said that cross-border e-commerce companies have increasingly diversified demands for payment solutions. They not only need safe and efficient payment methods, but also payment institutions that can provide value-added services.
He Dongdong believes that the cross-border e-commerce industry faces many challenges in payment. How to break through payment barriers, improve user experience, expand into emerging markets, and how to make breakthroughs in cost control and compliance operations are all issues that need to be solved urgently.
At present, payment institutions, by joining forces with industry ecological partners, are deeply involved in multiple dimensions such as payment, store opening, logistics, marketing, intellectual property, and tax refunds. They can provide cross-border enterprises with safe, compliant, and convenient one-stop cross-border services that integrate collection, payment, redemption, and management, and support merchants to expand the global market through various models such as cross-border stores, local stores, and brand overseas DTC.
For traditional foreign trade companies, with the acceleration of global digital transformation, more and more companies are beginning to seek digital payment solutions to improve operational efficiency and competitiveness.
Traditional foreign trade includes a large number of factory-based exporters, traders and factory sellers, who usually export goods in wholesale form.
Shen Enguang believes that the payment process in this field is relatively complex, but payment institutions have the ability to provide one-stop convenient payment solutions, so this market contains huge growth potential.
For export-oriented enterprises that integrate development, production, and sales, the problem of cross-border collection is very critical. Currently, payment institutions can use local collection accounts to reduce exchange links and exchange losses, increase corporate profits, and effectively ensure the safety of funds.
In addition, the expansion of enterprises into diversified markets has also brought new growth space to the cross-border payment industry.
Taking Lianlian International as an example, Shen Enguang revealed that the company is advancing its license layout in stages.
Initially, it mainly focused on the mature markets of Europe and the United States, but realized the single market risk caused by the United States’ indiscriminate tariffs.
Subsequently, following the pace of Chinese merchants, we increased our presence in emerging markets such as Southeast Asia, the Middle East and Latin America (including Mexico), established local teams and utilized partner resources to help Chinese companies take root in the local area.
“Last year, the Latin American e-commerce market grew rapidly, especially in Argentina, Chile and Mexico. More and more Chinese companies invested in building factories or setting up companies here.” Shen Enguang observed that the global trade activities of Chinese companies have gradually shifted to emerging countries. Taking advantage of this opportunity, companies have been continuously expanding their business scope and increasing market share in recent years.
