THE DIGITAL REMITTANCE REPORT: The new platforms disrupting a $600 billion industry (PYPL, WU, MGI)

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August 19, 2018 5:16 PM

This is a preview of a research report from Business Insider Intelligence, Business Insider's premium research service. To learn more about Business Insider Intelligence, click here.

Every year, migrants send hundreds of billions of dollars worth of remittances back to friends and family in their home country. And there's a massive industry that facilitates these payments — and has for more than a century.

The legacy remittance industry has been long dominated by cash, which requires physical locations where customers can hand over or pick up money. Building out those retail networks is a huge investment. It's left just a few players, called Money Transfer Operators (MTOs), controlling a bulk of the industry.

But these companies' comfortable hold on the industry is now being challenged by digital remittance startups. Digital-first remittance companies are competing on fees and usability, and capitalizing on the way people's expectations have changed with the advent of digital and mobile channels.

In a new report from BI Intelligence, we size the total remittance market, company-specific market share, digital's market share, and digital's growth at major remittance firms. We also assess how disruptive digital startups have been by comparing their fees with market leaders, and by juxtaposing their business models with those of legacy companies.

Here are some of the key takeaways:

In full, the report:

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