China-based third party online payment processor Alipay Zhifubao announced that its user number has reached 200 million by yesterday June 6, 2009. This made it overtake Papyal as world’s largest electronic payment gateway. Latest statistical data shows Paypal owns approximate 180 million users globally.
Zhifubao, a branch of Alibaba Group, debutted on Taobao.com in October 2003. It took Zhifubao 5 years to get the first 100 million users in the end of August 2008. The period shorted to 10 months to enlarge its user number from 100 million to 200 million.
Shao Xiaofeng, CEO of Alipay Zhifubao says even though the actual turnover value of Zhifubao is lower than that of Paypal for now, Zhifubao is expected to overtake Paypal in this regard in 3 years. Zhifubao uses RMB as its official settlement currency as its users are mainly from the Mainland China; While Paypal, with a global user coverage, uses U.S. Dollar as its official settlement currency. The large currency exchange rate between U.S. Dollar and Chinese Yuan weakens Zhifubao’s competition advantage over Paypal in terms of turnover value.