Wise to roll out multi-currency prepaid forex card for users in India

The UK fintech enters India's cross-border payments space, offering a card with 0.5% average FX fee and mid-market rates, challenging traditional markups

UK-based fintech Wise is rolling out a multi-currency prepaid foreign exchange (forex) card for users in India as the company doubles down on expanding its presence in the cross-border (CB) payments space. More than 75,000 users have joined the waitlist ahead of the full launch, said Taneia Bhardwaj, South Asia expansion lead at Wise.

 

Unlike most cards that carry forex markups of 2-4 per cent, Wise claims an average fee of around 0.5 per cent of the transaction value, while converting currencies at the mid-market rate. “When one spends using cards, the card network normally completes the conversion. But because of our licensing network and global reach, we carry out the conversion ourselves, and at the mid-market rate,” she said.

 

The card will support over 40 currencies, including common travel destinations such as Vietnam, Indonesia, Türkiye, and Georgia. It will be accepted at merchants in more than 160 countries on Visa’s network.

 

The forex card cannot be used for domestic transactions within India. However, users can make purchases at overseas online merchants. Bhardwaj said the card includes a smart conversion feature that automatically checks for the best available rate. “What the smart conversion feature does is pick the currency pair loaded on the card that offers the cheapest and best rate for the customer,” she said.

 

In June, Wise received in-principle approval from the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) to operate as a payment aggregator (PA) for CB export payments. It is now awaiting the final licence. This comes as the company claims to support about 10 per cent of all inward remittances to India.

 

Globally, Wise operates in 70 markets. “It’s one of our focus areas. We plan to double down, onboard new entity types, and add more enhancements to the existing product,” she said.

 

Currently, 11 entities hold a full RBI licence to operate as PA-CBs. Players in the space include Cashfree Payments, Razorpay, Skydo, BriskPe, and PayGlocal. “The differentiator for us is that we’re licensed in more than 70 countries. The infrastructure already exists. We offer the ability to collect payments from nearly 70 jurisdictions, which is an advantage,” she said. Wise is connected to eight payment rails globally.

 

On whether Wise could directly link to the Unified Payments Interface (UPI), Bhardwaj said: “Being directly connected to UPI would be amazing. However, non-banks aren’t allowed under current regulations. We’re actively seeking guidance from the regulator and ecosystem players, and it’s something we feel strongly about.”