UnionPay (), also known as China UnionPay () or by its abbreviation, CUP or UPI internationally, is a Chinese state-owned financial services corporation headquartered in

Shanghai Shanghai (; , , Standard Mandarin pronunciation: ) is one of the four direct-administered municipalities of the People's Republic of China (PRC). The city is located on the southern estuary of the Yangtze River, with the Huangpu River flowin ...

, China. It provides

bank card A bank card is typically a plastic card issued by a bank to its clients that performs one or more of a number of services that relate to giving the client access to bank account. Physically, a bank card will usually have the client's name, the ...

services and a major card scheme in

mainland China "Mainland China" is a geopolitical term defined as the territory governed by the People's Republic of China (including islands like Hainan or Chongming), excluding dependent territories of the PRC, and other territories within Greater China. ...

. Founded on 26 March 2002, China UnionPay is an association for China's banking card industry, operating under the approval of the

People's Bank of China The People's Bank of China (officially PBC or informally PBOC; ) is the central bank of the People's Republic of China, responsible for carrying out monetary policy and regulation of financial institutions in mainland China, as determined by ...

(PBOC, central bank of China). It is also an

electronic funds transfer Electronic funds transfer (EFT) is the electronic transfer of money from one bank account to another, either within a single financial institution or across multiple institutions, via computer-based systems, without the direct intervention of b ...

at point of sale (

EFTPOS Electronic funds transfer at point of sale (EFTPOS; ) is an electronic payment system involving electronic funds transfers based on the use of payment cards, such as debit or credit cards, at payment terminals located at points of sale. EFTPOS ...

) network, and the only interbank network in China that links all the automatic teller machine (ATMs) of all

bank A bank is a financial institution that accepts deposits from the public and creates a demand deposit while simultaneously making loans. Lending activities can be directly performed by the bank or indirectly through capital markets. Because ...

s throughout the country. UnionPay cards can be used in 180 countries and regions around the world. In 2015 the UnionPay overtook Visa and Mastercard in total value of payments made by customers and became the largest card payment processing organization ( debit and

credit card A credit card is a payment card issued to users (cardholders) to enable the cardholder to pay a merchant for goods and services based on the cardholder's accrued debt (i.e., promise to the card issuer to pay them for the amounts plus the o ...

s combined) in the world surpassing the two. However, only 0.5% of this payment volume was outside of China. UnionPay offers

mobile Mobile may refer to: Places * Mobile, Alabama, a U.S. port city * Mobile County, Alabama * Mobile, Arizona, a small town near Phoenix, U.S. * Mobile, Newfoundland and Labrador Arts, entertainment, and media Music Groups and labels * Mobile ( ...

and

online payment An e-commerce payment system (or an electronic payment system) facilitates the acceptance of electronic payment for offline transfer, also known as a subcomponent of electronic data interchange (EDI), e-commerce payment systems have become incre ...

s services.

History

With the approval of the

(PBOC), China UnionPay was launched on 26 March 2002, in Shanghai by PBOC governor Dai Xianglong, The Industrial and Commercial Bank of China, the

Agricultural Bank of China Agricultural Bank of China (ABC), also known as AgBank, is one of the " Big Four" banks in China. It was founded on 10 July 1951, and has its headquarters in Dongcheng District, Beijing. It has branches throughout mainland China, Hong Kong, ...

, the Bank of China and the

China Construction Bank China Construction Bank Corporation (CCB) is one of the " big four" banks in China. In 2015, CCB was the 2nd largest bank in the world by market capitalization and 6th largest company in the world. The bank has approximately 13,629 domestic branc ...

served as its first members. However, the concept of a unified Chinese bank card network dates back to 1993, with the formation of the "Golden Card Project" advocated by then- Chinese leader

Jiang Zemin Jiang Zemin (17 August 1926 – 30 November 2022) was a Chinese politician who served as general secretary of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) from 1989 to 2002, as chairman of the Central Military Commission from 1989 to 2004, and as pr ...

. UnionPay is considered its descendant, although attempts at unifying China's various credit card and interbank networks have been in place since the 1990s. In 2014, UnionPay was reported to have been contributing to

capital flight Capital flight, in economics, occurs when assets or money rapidly flow out of a country, due to an event of economic consequence or as the result of a political event such as regime change or economic globalization. Such events could be an increa ...

from China through poorly regulated store front operations in

Macau Macau or Macao (; ; ; ), officially the Macao Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China (MSAR), is a city and special administrative region of China in the western Pearl River Delta by the South China Sea. With a p ...

. The same year, the total amount of cross-bank transactions of CUP card exceeded 41.1 trillion yuan.

Partnerships

In 2005, UnionPay entered into agreements with other payment networks to increase acceptance around the world. Some major examples include: * Discover in United States *

RuPay RuPay ''(portmanteau of Rupee and Payment)'' is an Indian multinational financial services and payment service system, conceived and launched by the National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) on 26 March 2012. It was created to fulfil th ...

in India * JCB in Japan * BC Card in South Korea *

Mir ''Mir'' (russian: Мир, ; ) was a space station that operated in low Earth orbit from 1986 to 2001, operated by the Soviet Union and later by Russia. ''Mir'' was the first modular space station and was assembled in orbit from 1986 to&n ...

in Russia

Use outside of China : Europe

UnionPay announced in 2016 that more than 2.2 million merchants in 39 European countries and regions accept UnionPay, taking up 50% of all the merchants supporting bankcard payment. UnionPay is also accepted at business schools and Universities in order to allow Asian students to pay large sums of money for their tuition fees. Merchants from certain sectors considered "High risk" or prohibited by the government cannot open a UnionPay account.

Use outside of China : rest of the world

Some UnionPay credit cards are also affiliated with American Express (AmEx), MasterCard, or Visa, and they can be used abroad as American Express, MasterCard, or Visa credit cards. UnionPay debit cards, however, can only be used in the UnionPay network and other networks that have signed contracts with UnionPay. Since 2006, China UnionPay cards can be used in over 100 countries outside China. In May 2005, Discover Network announced an alliance with China UnionPay Network. The two companies have signed a long-term agreement that allows acceptance of Discover Network brand cards at UnionPay ATMs and point-of-sale terminals in China and acceptance of China UnionPay cards on the

PULSE In medicine, a pulse represents the tactile arterial palpation of the cardiac cycle (heartbeat) by trained fingertips. The pulse may be palpated in any place that allows an artery to be compressed near the surface of the body, such as at the n ...

network in the U.S. As of 1 November 2007, China UnionPay cards may be accepted where Discover Network Cards are accepted in the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territori ...

Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by tot ...

Mexico Mexico (Spanish: México), officially the United Mexican States, is a country in the southern portion of North America. It is bordered to the north by the United States; to the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; to the southeast by Guatema ...

Central America Central America ( es, América Central or ) is a subregion of the Americas. Its boundaries are defined as bordering the United States to the north, Colombia to the south, the Caribbean Sea to the east, and the Pacific Ocean to the west. ...

, and the Caribbean. As of early 2013, the cross acceptance agreement was expanded to support

e-commerce E-commerce (electronic commerce) is the activity of electronically buying or selling of products on online services or over the Internet. E-commerce draws on technologies such as mobile commerce, electronic funds transfer, supply chain managem ...

or card-not-present transactions. In March 2010,

PayPal PayPal Holdings, Inc. is an American multinational financial technology company operating an online payments system in the majority of countries that support online money transfers, and serves as an electronic alternative to traditional paper ...

announced a partnership with China UnionPay enabling the use of PayPal with UnionPay member cards. In 2015, China's State Administration of Foreign Exchange (SAFE) placed a ¥100,000 annual cap on overseas cash withdrawals from Chinese banks-issued UnionPay accounts. In November 2017, Azoya teamed up with UnionPay to enable consumers in China to profit from the Black Friday online shopping festival via a cross-border marketing platform.

2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine

On 6 March 2022,

Sberbank PJSC Sberbank (russian: Сбербанк, initially a contraction of russian: сберегательный банк, translit=sberegatelnyy bank, lit=savings bank, link=no) is a Russian majority state-owned banking and financial services compa ...

, Alfa Bank and

Tinkoff Bank Tinkoff Bank (russian: Тинькофф банк), formerly Tinkoff Credit Systems (russian: Тинькофф Кредитные Системы) is a Russian commercial bank based in Moscow and founded by Oleg Tinkov in 2006. The bank does no ...

reported several Russian banks would switch to UnionPay after Visa and Mastercard said they would suspend operations in Russia due to Russia's invasion of Ukraine. The Russian banks intend to tie the UnionPay system with Russia's

network. On 20 April 2022, UnionPay reportedly discontinued cooperation with major Russian banks including Sberbank. Russian media outlet RBC stated that they did so out of fear of secondary sanctions. In August 2022, it was reported that Russian visitors to Finland were circumventing banking restrictions by withdrawing Euros from Finnish cash machines using UnionPay cards.

Members

UnionPay is the primary network of these Chinese banks: *

* Bank of China (including its Hong Kong-based subsidiaries Nanyang Commercial Bank and BOC Hong Kong) * Bank of Communications (Credit cards ) *

Bank of Beijing Bank of Beijing Co., Ltd. (abb. BOB) is an urban commercial bank based in Beijing, China. According to the bank, most of the revenue came from Beijing, despite that the banking group had more than half of the branches located outside the direct- ...

* Bank of Ningbo * Bank of Shanghai *

China CITIC Bank China CITIC Bank () is China's seventh-largest lender in terms of total assets. It was known as CITIC Industrial Bank until it changed its name in August 2005. China CITIC Bank, established in 1987, is a nationally comprehensive and internationa ...

China Everbright Bank China Everbright Bank Co., Ltd. is one of twelve Chinese joint-stock commercial bank. Established in August 1992, it is a national joint-stock commercial bank approved by the State Council and approved by the People's Bank of China, headquarte ...

China Merchants Bank China Merchants Bank (CMB) () is a Chinese bank headquartered in Futian District, Shenzhen, Guangdong, China. Founded in 1987, it is the first share-holding commercial bank wholly owned by corporate legal entities in China. CMB has over five hun ...

* China Minsheng Banking Corporation * Guangdong Development Bank * Huaxia Bank (Credit cards co-issued with

Deutsche Bank Deutsche Bank AG (), sometimes referred to simply as Deutsche, is a German multinational investment bank and financial services company headquartered in Frankfurt, Germany, and dual-listed on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange and the New York Sto ...

) * Industrial and Commercial Bank of China (ICBC) * Industrial Bank (Credit cards co-issued with

Hang Seng Bank Hang Seng Bank Limited () is a Hong Kong-based banking and financial services company with headquarters in Central, Hong Kong. It is one of Hong Kong's leading public companies in terms of market capitalisation and is part of the HSBC Group, ...

) * Ping An Bank * Postal Savings Bank of China (formerly known as the China Postal Savings and Remittance Bureau) *

Shanghai Pudong Development Bank Shanghai Pudong Development Bank Co. Ltd (SPDB or Pufa; ) is a state-owned joint-stock commercial bank, established in 1993, with its headquarters located in Shanghai. Shanghai Pudong Development Bank issued a 400 million A-share offer on Septemb ...

* Taizhou City Commercial Bank Other UnionPay-affiliated organisations include municipal commercial banks as well as rural credit cooperatives. Overall, there are 165 financial institutions that issue UnionPay cards. UnionPay had partnered with JETCO in

Hong Kong Hong Kong ( (US) or (UK); , ), officially the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China (abbr. Hong Kong SAR or HKSAR), is a city and special administrative region of China on the eastern Pearl River Delta i ...

and

until 1 January 2006. As of January 2013, Bank of East Asia and Citibank were the only banks allowed to independently issue UnionPay credit cards in Hong Kong and the mainland. HSBC and its subsidiary Hang Seng Bank independently issue UnionPay credit cards in Hong Kong, while they issue cards in the mainland in cooperation with local banks as noted above. Deutsche Bank only has co-issued cards, with no independently issued UnionPay credit cards. The following eleven foreign banks have the right to issue UnionPay debit cards in China: *

Bank of China (Hong Kong) Bank of China (Hong Kong) Limited () also known as its short name Bank of China (Hong Kong) or BOCHK (), is a subsidiary of the Bank of China (via a Hong Kong-listed intermediate holding company BOC Hong Kong (Holdings)). Bank of China (Hong ...

Bank of East Asia The Bank of East Asia Limited, often abbreviated to BEA, is a Hong Kong banking and financial services company, headquartered in Central, Hong Kong. It is currently the largest independent local Hong Kong bank, and one of two remaining family ...

* Citibank * DBS Bank (as of July 2009) *

Hana Bank Hana Bank (; KEB Hana Bank outside South Korea) is a commercial bank headquartered in Seoul, South Korea. Since its establishment as Korea Exchange Bank in 1967, it provides the largest range of foreign exchange products in South Korea. History ...

(as of November 2009) *

* HSBC *

OCBC Bank Oversea-Chinese Banking Corporation, Limited (), often known as OCBC Bank (), is a Singaporean multinational banking and financial services corporation headquartered in OCBC Centre, Singapore. OCBC Bank was born out of the Great Depression thr ...

(as of 2010) * OCBC Wing Hang Bank (as of 2010) * Standard Chartered Bank *

Woori Bank Woori Bank (Hangul: 우리은행 ''Uri Eunhaeng'') is a Korean multinational bank headquartered in Seoul. It is one of the four largest domestic banks in South Korea and is showing a strong presence not only for commercial banking but also for co ...

(as of May 2009) UnionPay in other countries: *

AGD Bank AGD may refer to: * AGD Interactive, a non-profit software company * Academy of General Dentistry *Association for Genome Diagnostics * Airgun Designs, a manufacturer of paintball equipment * Agarabi language * ''The Ambiguously Gay Duo'', an animat ...

offers a UnionPay debit card in Myanmar *

Askari Bank Askari Bank Ltd (), formerly Askari Commercial Bank, is a commercial and retail bank in Pakistan and is owned by Fauji Foundation, part of Pakistan Army. History It was founded on October 9, 1991, as a public limited company. On June 21, 2013, ...

offers a UnionPay debit card in Pakistan * Australia Post, previously distributed the "Load&Go China" card, issued by Bank of China ( Australia) Limited; featuring imagery of the Great Wall *

Baiduri Bank Baiduri Bank, established in 1994, is a member of the Baiduri Bank Group in Brunei. The Baiduri Bank Group comprises Baiduri Bank and two wholly owned subsidiaries, Baiduri Finance and Baiduri Capital. The Bank's shareholders are Baiduri Holdin ...

offers a UnionPay debit card in Brunei *

Bangkok Bank Bangkok Bank Public Company Limited ( th, ธนาคารกรุงเทพ, RTGS: Thanakhan Krung Thep) is one of the largest commercial banks in Thailand. Its branch network includes over 1,165 branches, As of September 2018 within Thail ...

offers a UnionPay credit card in Thailand *

Bank Central Asia PT Bank Central Asia Tbk, commonly known as Bank Central Asia (BCA) is an Indonesian bank founded on 21 February 1957. It is considered as the largest privately owned bank in Indonesia. The Asian financial crisis in 1997 had a tremendous impact ...

offers a UnionPay credit card in Indonesia * Banque Pour Le Commerce Exterieur Lao (BCEL) offers both UnionPay debit and Credit card in Laos * Bank Sinarmas offers a UnionPay debit card in Indonesia * BDO Unibank offers a UnionPay credit card in the Philippines * Cebuana Lhuillier Micro Savings offers 24K UnionPay Debit Card in the Philippines. * CIM Bank, a Swiss Bank, offers UnionPay credit cards to domestic and foreign customers * DBS Bank offers a UnionPay debit card in Singapore. * Halyk Bank offers both UnionPay credit and debit cards in Kazakhstan *

Gazprombank Gazprombank (russian: Газпромбанк), or GPB (JSC), is a private-owned Russian bank, the third largest bank in the country by assets. Since November 2014, Yuri Shamalov's Gazfond is its largest shareholder. The bank’s principal busine ...

offers both UnionPay credit & debit cards in Russia. * Joint Stock Commercial Bank for Foreign Trade of Vietnam (Vietcombank) offers both UnionPay credit and debit cards in Vietnam * Kasikornbank offers a UnionPay credit card in Thailand * Kazkommertsbank offers UnionPay credit cards in Kazakhstan * Krung Thai Bank offers a UnionPay debit card in Thailand * Lotte Card offers a UnionPay credit card in the Republic of Korea. * Mitsubishi UFJ NICOS offers a UnionPay credit card in Japan. * offers a UnionPay credit card in Azerbaijan. * SCT Networks offers a UnionPay Debit card in Nepal. *

Himalayan Bank Himalayan Bank Limited (HBL) is one of the largest private banks in Nepal. The Bank was incorporated in 1992 by a few eminent individuals of Nepal in partnership with the Employees' Provident Fund Organisation of India, Employees Provident Fund a ...

offers a UnionPay Prepaid cards in Nepal. * Nepal Investment Bank Limited offers a UnionPay cards in Nepal. * NIC ASIA Bank offers a UnionPay virtual cards in Nepal. * AmBank offers a UnionPay Credit card in Malaysia. *

Public Bank A public bank is a bank, a financial institution, in which a state, municipality, or public actors are the owners. It is an enterprise under government control.

offers a UnionPay Debit card in Malaysia. *

Philippine National Bank The Philippine National Bank (PNB, Filipino/ tl, Bangko Nasyonal ng Pilipinas, lit=; es, Banco Nacional Filipino; Hokkien ) is one of the largest banks in the Philippines. It was established by the Philippine government on July 22, 1916, duri ...

(PNB) offers a UnionPay credit card in the Philippines. *

Rizal Commercial Banking Corporation The Rizal Commercial Banking Corporation (RCBC) () is one of the largest universal banks in the Philippines with total consolidated resources of Php 959 billion. It was established in 1960 as a development bank and is licensed by the Bangko ...

(RCBC) offers a UnionPay credit card in the Philippines. * Sacombank offers both UnionPay credit and debit cards in Vietnam * Mitsui Sumitomo Bank offers a UnionPay credit card in Japan. *

Shinhan Bank Shinhan Bank Co., Ltd. () is a bank headquartered in Seoul, South Korea. Historically it was the first bank in Korea, established under the name Hanseong Bank in 1897. The bank was reestablished in 1982. It is part of the Shinhan Financial Gro ...

offers a UnionPay credit card in the Republic of Korea. *

United Overseas Bank United Overseas Bank Limited (), often known as UOB, is a Singaporean multinational banking corporation headquartered in Singapore, with branches mostly found in most Southeast Asian countries. Founded in 1935 as United Chinese Bank (UCB) by S ...

offers a UnionPay credit card in Singapore. * Vostochny Express Bank offers both UnionPay credit & debit cards in Russia. * National Bank of Pakistan offers UnionPay debit cards in Pakistan. * 1LINK offers UnionPay debit cards through its member banks in Pakistan. * Credicorp Bank offers UnionPay debit cards in Panama.

References

External links

* * * {{Interbank networks Financial services companies established in 2002 2002 establishments in China Banking in China Cooperatives in China Credit card issuer associations Credit cards Debit card issuer associations Financial services companies of China Interbank networks Organizations established in 2002 Multinational companies headquartered in China Chinese brands Government-owned companies of China