Ripple partner Terrapay has announced its intention to strengthen its entry in North America with an approved FINTRAC Canada MSB License. This is big news, especially for a sector that is seeing blockchain technology revolutionize itself, especially since as per the World Bank’s data for 2018, the outward remittance value from Canada was as high as $27 billion.
With Canada among the many countries to see its share of digital remittances grow, a global move towards cashless economies seems to be underway.
To capitalize on such a dynamic remittance market, Terrapay announced its MSB registration with the Financial Transactions and Reports Analysis Centre of Canada (FINTRAC). The said license will facilitate the company’s cross-border payments infrastructure to mobilize international remittances from the region in real-time and at low costs.
The addition of the FINTRAC license, and thereby, the Canadian remittance market, will add to the company’s 45 regulatory and local licenses, two billion bank accounts, and over 500 million mobile wallets across 100 countries and 58 settlement currencies.
As Canada allows the legal use of cryptocurrencies, this is an important move for Terrapay, as it can now potentially use XRP to facilitate cross-border payments.
As pointed out by Brad Garlinghouse at the recent Swell Conference, Ripple has a global payment network of over 200 financial institutions. However, only 20% of RippleNet’s transactions are performed using XRP.
Terrapay’s Canadian market venture, along with its $9.6 million investment from Prime Ventures, IFC, and Partech for expansion into new markets, has fueled speculation that XRP will likely be used sometime in the future.
The grant of the aforementioned license will likely imply huge volumes of international transfers, all captured by the Ripple Partner Company.