The Interledger Foundation, an organization advocating for an open and interoperable payment network, is teaming up with fintech company Chimoney to facilitate cross-border payments across more than 130 countries. Chimoney will integrate its payment infrastructure integration with the Interledger Protocol (ILP), an open-source protocol for transferring payments across various ledgers, independent of any single blockchain or currency.
This partnership will facilitate peer-to-peer transfers to more than 130 countries, and ensure that businesses can accept payments, handle disbursements, and offer payout options to banks worldwide. Additionally, it allows beneficiaries of cash-based transfers to bypass significant bank fees, exchange rates, and other transaction charges that are traditionally required to send and receive money internationally. This makes the process more cost-effective for everyone involved.
A Force for Access
The Interledger Foundation works to increase access to digital financial services for the 1.4 billion people worldwide currently excluded from the traditional banking system. The organization works with its partners to integrate ILP into both existing and emerging financial and payments infrastructures.
Chimoney has been a recipient of Interledger’s Digital Financial Services grant program, which supports the growth of interoperable payment capabilities across global financial infrastructures. Interledger also works closely with the Mojaloop Foundation, a coalition of nonprofits dedicated to building real-time digital payment systems for developing countries. Founded in 2020 by a group led by the Gates Foundation and Google, Mojaloop focuses on advancing financial inclusion.
“With Interledger, we’re able to roll out our fintech-in-a-box solution to more regions and networks quickly,” Chimoney CEO Uchi Uchibeke told PaymentsJournal. “This speed and access would be much harder if we were relying on governments or banks to create a protocol like ILP. Interledger’s nonprofit approach also ensures a neutral, global reach, enabling fintechs like us to innovate faster and deliver real value to users across borders.”
Growing Plans
The initiative with Chimoney follows an earlier plan, announced earlier this year, to enable banks in rural Mexican communities to receive cross-border payments from the U.S. Interledger teamed up with The People’s Clearinghouse to streamline cross-border payment capabilities at 140 community banks in Mexico.
While these projects are worthwhile, they also highlight the need for nonprofits to play a key role in fostering cross-border payments in areas that may not seem immediately profitable. Additionally, they may also spur more interest from existing cross-border protocols.
“This is clearly not designed for large commercial enterprises,” said Albert Bodine, Director of Commercial and Enterprise Payments at Javelin strategy & Research. “It will be interesting to see if the card networks, SWIFT, and others get into the game of connecting the instant payments networks, something that would be used by both the unbanked and large B2B interests. That would blow this out of the water.”