Singapore’s Nium gets license to expand services to Malaysia

Singapore-based remittance unicorn Nium expanded its real-time payment service to Malaysia after being issued a license by the country’s central bank.

With the International Remittance Hub license issued by Bank Negara Malaysia, Nium can now onboard licensed corporations of all sizes to its platform, including financial institutions and payment service providers in the country.

The license expands the reach of Nium’s Pay Out feature to more than 190 markets globally. It also enables Malaysian businesses to make settlements in ringgit and save on technology and compliance costs by giving them access to Nium’s APIs and licenses with various countries’ regulators.

The Singapore-based remittance unicorn also gets an outbound limit of up to 6 million ringgit (US$1.36  million) per day and the ability to control end-user pricing. 

According to Globaldata’s Prime Time for Real-Time 2022 report, Malaysia recorded 1.1 billion real-time payment transactions in 2021. The country is also expected to process 3.6 billion real-time transactions in 2026. 

In July last year, Nium became the first global B2B payments unicorn from Southeast Asia, following a US$200 million series D funding round led by US-based Riverwood Capital.

Last month, the remittance firm announced its acquisition of alternative payment network platform Socash for an undisclosed sum. The deal will provide Nium with the team and tech to accept several forms of local payment methods for digital commerce, especially in emerging markets.

See also: Remittance startup Nium shaves losses, more than doubles revenue in 2020.

Currency converted from Malaysian ringgit to US dollar: US$1 = 4.06 ringgit.