The wise payments model

UniCredit said it will partner with UK-based Wise to offer international transfers. “The Milan-based lender will integrate Wise’s technology in the coming weeks and is aiming to make it available to all of its European retail clients by 2027,” reports Bloomberg.

“The partnership comes after the lender launched a review and found it had ‘shortcomings’ in its mobile banking payments offerings, according to Raphael Barisaac, UniCredit’s global head of payments and cash management.

‘We took the international payment piece and decided to revamp it completely,’ Barisaac said in an interview, noting that the group payments solutions division — which includes FX, as well as domestic transfers, card payments across retail and corporate clients — is expected to contribute €400 million in additional fees by 2027.”

It’s a big win for Wise, which has already struck deals with Standard Chartered and Morgan Stanley to use its international payments network. Originally a retail money transfer and payments business, it expects its Platform business to grow from 4% of its income to 50% in the coming years. Wise is in the process of joining Japan’s Zengin and Brazil’s Pix systems.

“Banks are looking to transform payments and UniCredit are really not just looking at the rails,” Steve Naudé, managing director of Wise Platform, said in an interview. “They’re looking at that end-to-end experience.”