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Santander, a major banks across the globe, has announced that it will be using Ripple’s technology to open up what it calls a “payment corridor” to let customers send money between Latin America and the US. This will be effected throughOne Pay FX, which is a mobile app that uses Ripple’s xCurrent software.

This is not anything new for Santander, as the service through One Pay FX is already allowing customers in the UK and Spain to send money to the US, instantly and free. This is an expansion which will open the doors for remittances between North and South America. 

It must be expressed that this is not necessarily a cryptocurrency expansion as cCurrent is not XRP powered, rather another product of Ripple’s. However, it is still a step towards better Distributed Ledger Technology, which is what Santander has been operating in thus far. 

A changing of the guard

While this news is not directly a bank on the level of Santander actively pursuing cryptocurrency, it is still a step to better adoption of alternative ways to send money across borders. It has become quite clear that the traditional means of international transfer and money remittance has been poor, and in need of updating. 

In fact, Cedric Menager, CEO of One Pay FX, told CoinDesk that the service is getting traction.

“Customers who were not doing international transfers are now using the service, customers who were using international transfers are now doing it more, and customers who had gone to use fintech competition have come back because of the One Pay offering,” he said.

xCurrent can be seen more as an upgrade to SWIFT, rather than a full-on cryptocurrency, however, it has similar benefits as it allows for near instant transaction, and has no fees. This, for those who need to send money to family between the North and South of America, can obviously benefit.

More uses

There are no figures available as to how much volume has gone through One Pay FX, however, it has been admitted that the figures have tripled from January to June, and volumes for Spain increased by 120 percent year-over-year in April.

 It is expected that the South American market will have a big part to play as well because not only is One Pay FX quick and free, it is also a lot easier as it means that customers can make their international payment from an online app rather than having to come into the branch to send the money. 

“The international payment experience in the Latin American markets is even less evolved than in the European markets,” Menager added. “There are even parts of the Latin American market where it’s almost impossible to do an online international payment.”

International banks are starting to appreciate that there are alternatives to sending money across border now. Some have gone with Ripple’s technology without XRP, while some are actively using XRP. There are even some banks, like JPMorgan, who have created their own coins. 

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