Citi and JCB International (JCBI), the international operations subsidiary of JCB will extend their partnership by adding JCB credit card merchants in nine countries and territories throughout Asia. The agreement covers JCB acceptance in all of Citibank’s acquiring markets in the region, enabling the bank’s merchant base, both physical and ecommerce, to accept JCB cards across the region.
Citibank will phase in JCB card acceptance for purchases at Citibank merchants in Hong Kong, Vietnam, Thailand, Philippines, Malaysia and Indonesia, together with expanding the existing relationships in Singapore, Taiwan and Guam. The bank targets to complete acceptance at all of its existing merchants which includes EC merchants as well as retailers within 18 months.
JCB and JCBI expanded the JCB card outside of Japan in 1981, celebrating their 30th anniversary of overseas growth this year. In recent years, JCB and JCBI have been accelerating this expansion in Asia form the over 69 million JCB cardmembers, who are largely based in Asia, to offer increased flexibility and convenience for cardmembers.
For Citibank, the alliance with JCBI will bring the bank’s merchants more payment options and sales opportunities generated by the growing JCB cardmember base in Asia. With this transaction Citibank will be the only provider of acquiring services to merchants for all the major credit card brands in the world in markets across Asia Pacific.
Kimihisa Imada, deputy president of JCBI, says, “South East Asia, Hong Kong and Taiwan are some of the most important markets for JCB because of the strong growth and increased retail spending. We are delighted to commence a business tie with such an influential institution as Citibank, which has strong networks across these important markets. We are excited about the opportunities in this expanded relationship with Citibank to offer more of our clients access to our leading services both in EC market as well as in retail markets in the region.”
