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UnionPay International And Unicredit Strengthen Partnership Through New Agreement
Parties will cooperate across a number of fronts, including the issuance of UnionPay branded cards in Italy, geographical expansion and payment innovation
2019-04-01


UnionPay International and UniCredit today announced that they have signed a letter of intent in order to strengthen their existing partnership. 

The agreement outlines the intention for the two organisations to cooperate around the issuance of UnionPay branded cards in Italy, the expansion of UnionPay’s activities into other European countries – particularly Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Croatia, Serbia, Bosnia and Herzegovina -  in collaboration with UniCredit’s vast network of subsidiaries, and mobile payments innovation.

The new agreement will broaden the range of payments products that UniCredit makes available to its customers.

UnionPay, which boasts the world’s largest cardholder base, has become the favourite overseas payment method for Chinese cardholders.  

Cooperation between UnionPay and UniCredit dates back to 2013. To date, UnionPay is accepted in Italy at all UniCredit ATMs and its entire merchant network of over 200,000 point of sale (POS) terminals. Last year, UniCredit enabled contactless payments on its POS terminals for UnionPay cardholders. This year, the bank also plans to enable its online merchants to accept UnionPay. 

In 2017, UniCredit and UnionPay began their international cooperation outside of Italy through an acquiring agreement with UniCredit’s Turkish subsidiary. 

In Europe, UnionPay is accepted at more than 3.3 million merchants in 40 countries and regions, covering more than 60% of all the bankcard-accepting merchants.  Meanwhile, its global network has extended to 174 countries and regions, which covers 52 million merchants and 2.6 million ATMs worldwide.
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