The preference for digital channels is among those who send money from abroad, since 75% of Mexicans who send remittances to their relatives use a digital channel, the study refers. On the part of remittance recipients, only 66% collect them through digital channels.
“We believe that the convenience of not having to visit a branch will also create a different habit of using remittances,” Rubén Salazar, global leader of Visa Direct, said in an interview.
The businessman points out that with physical channels, those who send remittances have to wait longer to send money, while with digital channels they can send lower amounts but more frequently.
“If before two months a month he sent around 300 or 500, now he will do it faster and he will send less each week, but more or less the same amount of remittance will arrive,” added Salazar.
The Visa study highlights that another of the benefits of digitization is practicality, in addition to the fact that the rates are higher in physical channels.
The manager of the issuing company highlighted that the sending of remittances through digital channels is low in Mexico when compared to other countries such as Peru, where adoption is 52%.
The road to digitization can be long because 34% of Mexicans prefer to go to a branch and 11% of those surveyed choose to wait for their relative to arrive from abroad and bring them the cash.
“There is still a way to go, we believe we are in the early years of seeing mass adoption of digital media and with that comes a whole security issue,” he added.
Regarding the use of stable cryptocurrencies such as the USD stablecoin, Visa said that Mexicans use cryptocurrencies more as an investment method and few use crypto assets to collect remittances.