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Striving to make a breakthrough in the Balkan region to support the Belt and Road Initiative
China UnionPay President Shi Wenchao met and reached consensus with the Senior Management of local institutions in Serbia
2017-11-28


On Nov. 27, China UnionPay President Shi Wenchao met with Executive Director of Komercijalna Dejan Tesic, AIK Chair of the Board Jelena Galic, and Banca Intesa Executive Director Drako Popovic, during his visit to Serbia.

Over the past few years, Serbia is the country in the Balkan region with the fastest economic growth. The country is drawing large amount of Chinese investment and a large number of Chinese tourists too. Komercijalna is the largest commercial bank in Serbia, having more than 10,000 POS terminals and 262 ATMs in Serbia. 65% of its POS terminals support contactless payment. AIK is one of the leading banks in Serbia, having 4,500 POS terminals and 250 ATMs in Serbia and Slovenia. It has strong advantages in tourism industry in particular. Banca Intesa is the subsidiary company of Intesa Sanpaolo Group in Serbia. With over 35% market share in terms of acquiring, it is one of the leading banks in the market.

Shi Wenchao had in-depth communication with the abovementioned institutions and reached extensive consensus. At the meeting, Shi Wenchao introduced that the UnionPay global acceptance network covers 162 countries and regions with more than 6.5 billion cards issued worldwide. UnionPay hopes to deepen its cooperation with Serbia’s financial institutions, from card acceptance to local card issuance and innovative payments such as online payment and digital wallets, to offer more convenient, secure and efficient payment services to UnionPay cardholders.

The management of the institutions said they wish to deepen and expand their collaboration with China UnionPay, to provide comprehensive payment service for Chinese customers. It is said that 45,000 Chinese tourists visited Serbia in 2016 and this number is expected to continue to grow. Chinese companies are making investments in Serbia too, with more than 50,000 Chinese people working in Serbia. Therefore, there is large demand for cross-border payments. The institutions will carry out collaboration with UnionPay as soon as possible to make bigger breakthroughs in Serbia.

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