Nuno Matos, CEO of HSBC’s wealth and personal banking division, says the financial organization aims to “attack” the fintech market with the launch of new FX payments app Zing. He said there was.
The move to launch Zing is a direct challenge to the likes of Wise, Revolut and Monzo, which have built large customer bases by offering cheap foreign exchange rates.
Initially launched in the UK, Zing will soon be available on Apple’s App Store and Alphabet Inc.’s Google Pay, and will be rolled out to other markets around the world in the coming months.
Zing: HSBC’s answer to modern international payments
Zing will be available to everyone, not just existing HSBC customers, and will be available at any time.
Commenting on the launch of Zing, HSBC CEO Mattos said: We want to establish ourselves as a global platform for international payments. This is fully aligned with HSBC’s international payments strategy and will soon be seen in markets across Asia, the Middle East and the EU.
The move represents HSBC’s attempt to regain customer acquisition and retention rates amid the growing popularity of neobanks and foreign exchange payment providers.
In this issue of FinTech Magazine (January 2024), we asked how traditional financial institutions will respond in 2024 to the growing popularity of challenger banks and digital financial services organizations.
Well, HSBC appears to be one of the first global banking giants to take notable action so far this year.
Of course, HSBC has already taken steps to launch a global money product in 2020 and match it with fintech-enabled challengers.
Global Money offers free currency services to its customers, but the difference now is that Zing is available to everyone. This marks HSBC’s growing efforts to keep up with challengers in today’s digital banking race.
HSBC’s hope is that people who use Zing will be encouraged to use the bank’s wider range of financial services.
Matos concludes:[Zing is] It’s a bold move for us. This is HSBC playing outside of its traditional customer boundaries and, by necessity, creating a contingent that is large, growing, similar to us, and here for us. They are using it to really attack. ”