UnionBank of The Philippines Collaborates With OCBC Bank to Use Blockchain-Based Remittance Service From Singapore to The Philippines

The Union Bank of the Philippines and OCBC Bank of Singapore have entered into a partnership, and the objective is to enhance financial inclusion across the Philippines.

The Philippines largest bank UnionBank is the first bank to use blockchain-powered payment service starting from Singapore till the Philippines.

The service was successfully executed in collaboration with OCBC Singapore Bank, which is the largest established bank of Singapore, by utilizing the Adhara platform and global payments platform.

On June 27^th, UnionBank used blockchain powered tokenized fiat currency to effectively send from Singapore’s OCBC Bank to owner account at Rural Bank of Cantilan, which is a bank located within Surigao Del Sur region amid high pressure for financial inclusion for Filipinos in accordance with Philippines government’s mandate.

This execution was only possible by integrating the properties of two platforms, namely the Adhara platform and UnionBank- UBX’s i2i platform.

Melchor Plabasan, BSP Technology Risk and Innovation Supervision Department office-in charge said: “Rest assured that the BSP will continue to support initiatives aimed at creating an enabling remittance environment for our overseas Filipinos. We look forward to exciting times ahead as we engage more meaningfully for a modern, inclusive, and progressive remittance landscape.”

Chief Financial officer of MAS (Monetary Authority of Singapore), Sopnendu Mohanty told that, through Project Ubin in 2016, we initially started functioning with the financial sector to discover the scope of blockchain technology for remittances. We are passionate to notice blockchain potential being launched, with cross border payment solutions, that are currently less expensive, safe and fast over the Union Bank’s i2i platform.

He added this blockchain-based initiative would significantly affect social and economic sectors across rural groups. We’re delighted as the Adhara development team in 2017 had operated across stage 2 of Ubin Project and strengthened the learning’s to make this project alive.

Adopting blockchain-based technology for bank-to-bank cross-border remittance improves financial services, mainly in less developed areas, as users will notice cost savings and can directly exchange easily. This is due to blockchain technology; the transaction stored on the distributed ledger is accurate, transparent, and immutable allows for automatic verification and automatic settlements.

President and CEO of UnionBank, Edwin Bautista informed, i2i network of UnionBank, the blockchain-powered platform, is currently controlled and run by the fully owned fintech subsidiary of UnionBank UBX. Allowing this pilot project is the formation and use of a tokenized fiat PHX of UnionBank. PHX expected to be launched in coming days across the Philippines.

I2i is basically a blockchain platform that connects banks of rural area to one another and to the Union Bank of Philippines. This offers financially ignored rural banks, to obtain the additional services that can be given via the i2i network, thus allowing ‘a banking-as-a service platform.’

The objective of the i2i platform is to get millions of Philippines people who do not use bank services to the financing system by joining banks of rural areas to leading financial system of the Philippines via blockchain technology.

Currently, rural banks of the Philippines have a minimum approach towards financial systems, and international fund transfer would take 5 to 7 days to get added to a successor account. The other technique for people living outside the Philippines is to make use of non-banking payment counter, and this need in-person exchange at the sides, receiver and sender, the service is expensive.

OCBC and UnionBank will openly verify the remitting system from Singapore to a rural bank of Philippine through i2i and Adhara platforms in November during the Singapore Fintech Festival.