That was the affirmation of Safdar Khan, a veteran member of Mastercard, who had just taken on the role of the Group’s head of emerging markets in Southeast Asia.
According to Nikkei, in Asia, in the battle of electronic payment, Visa and Mastercard were facing many challenges when credit cards seemed to be less popular than electronic wallets. How did Mastercard comment on this idea, and what were the future options?
Mastercard had long supported breakthrough efforts before challenges, instead of choosing to avoid. As a global payment technology company, Mastercard always accompanied Fintech companies, including e-wallet issuer.
According to Safdar Khan, Mastercard helped Fintech companies move up the new ladder by connecting them with future technology partners, radical solutions, and paving the way for creativity.
Like Mastercard, e-wallet companies in particular, Fintech, in general, had the goal of further expanding the borders, creating space for Fintech to unleash their creativity to create a safe, comfortable, and productive environment for everyone.
In today’s technological world, in the way people interacted, daily activities had changed dramatically. The rise of Fintech also partly created an increased efficiency for the work that Mastercard was carrying out in the payment environment.
Together, Mastercard could maintain the goal of ensuring customers’ ability to choose flexibly and comfortably in managing and spending their money anytime, anywhere.
How did Mastercard rate Fintech firms in Vietnam? Did Mastercard have a specific strategy for cooperating with Vietnamese Fintech?
In Safdar Khan’s opinion, Vietnam had become a Fintech centre in Asean. In particular, Hochiminh City and Hanoi emerged as the ‘capital’ of Fintech and technology, especially in 2019, 36 percent of investment capital in Vietnam flowed into this field.
Many investors considered Vietnam to be a key market for peer-to-peer lending (P2P lending), credit rating and mobile payment.
That was why Mastercard wanted to bring to the market special initiatives such as the Start Path, Mastercard’s start-up programme for startups, and Fintech Express, which enabled Fintech to accelerate further.
Such initiatives would help promote the growth of Fintech companies, especially small ones.
In the overall picture of the region, how was the growth potential of non-cash payment in Vietnam evaluated? Is there any lesson from the previous market that Vietnam could refer to?
Vietnam was a desirable market. Just by looking at the numbers below, it’s easy to see why businesses are feeling so excited about joining the market.
As of September 2019, there were 59 million Internet users in Vietnam. According to GlobalWebIndex, 78 percent of internet users in Vietnam aged 16 to 64 had ever shopped online. In 2018, Vietnamese consumers spent nearly $6 billion when buying goods online.
Vietnam’s e-commerce market was expected to become the second-largest market in Southeast Asia, just behind Indonesia in the next six years.
According to the Payment Department of the State Bank of Vietnam (SBV), transactions via mobile applications in 2018 had increased by 126%, while via e-wallets increased by 161%. That was such impressive growth.
Notably, the government had taken measures to promote electronic payment activities, including cards, e-wallets, mobile applications and Internet Banking.
These policies, along with the development of the Internet, smart mobile popularisation in urban areas, increased income and consumption, the growth of e-commerce, had created a solid foundation to help the application of electronic payment methods further develop there.
However, despite the efforts mentioned above, cash was still favoured by consumers and businesses, especially in everyday transactions.
To overcome that, it was necessary to reorient consumers about the need for non-cash payments and practical benefits.
Users needed to know how to use electronic payment and why this method was safer and more effective than cash.
Besides, it was necessary to develop payment technologies to help economic organisations expand their operations, able to carry out modern payment methods for people living in isolated areas.
According to Safdar Khan, a member of Mastercard, they did not doubt that Vietnam would soon become a cashless country. That was why Mastercard was actively cooperating with the government and partners, including banks, Fintech, businesses, to improve options with electronic payment.
