On August 30th, it was announced by BC Card (President and CEO Chae Jong-jin, www.bccard.com) that they have concluded an MOU with the National Payment Corporation of Vietnam (NAPAS) to cooperate in the payment settlement business.

NAPAS is an intermediary payment service provider established in 2015 under the State Bank of Vietnam. It is providing financial payment and settlement services to around 100 million customers of 43 domestic commercial banks via 2.2 million branch offices, 270,000 POS, and 17,000 ATMs.

The MOU conclusion ceremony was held at the NAPAS headquarters located in Hanoi, Vietnam at 11 a.m. on August 30th (local time), with President Chae Jong-jin of BC Card, Chairman Nguyen Tu Anh of NAPAS, Lim Nam-hun, the Head of Global Business Division at BC Card, and President Le Quoc Hung of NAPAS in attendance.

At present, more than 80% of consumers in Vietnam use debit cards issued by the local banks. The State Bank of Vietnam and NAPAS are currently seeking measures to promote non-cash payment methods, with the aim of reducing cash payments to less than 10% by 2020.

Based on the MOU, BC Card will ▲ form a network partnership with NAPAS and provide ▲ Vietnam-Korea remittance services together with NAPAS for the purpose of establishing a “cashless society” in Vietnam, with the State Bank of Vietnam playing a leading role.

Chae Jong-jin, the President of BC Card, stated, “The fact that we have established a partnership with NAPAS, a prominent infrastructure operator in Vietnam, which will lead the economic growth of ASEAN countries in the future, is truly meaningful. […] We will use our diverse payment settlement solutions, platforms and operation know-how as much as possible to contribute to the development of the Vietnamese credit card market.”