MoneyGram Philippines, the local unit of Nasdaq-listed Moneygram International, expects a 3 percent to 4-percent growth in remittance business this year on sustained inflows from overseas Filipino workers.
MoneyGram Philippines country manager Alex Chan Lim told Manila Standard the company was following the projection made by Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas about a 4-percent growth in remittances this year.
“We don’t deviate from them because they are the ones who know. We have majority of the Filipinos in the Middle East, which is a major source of remittances,” Lim said at the sidelines of a news briefing in Makati City. “So far, remittance business is doing good.”
Latest data from Bangko Sentral showed that money sent home by overseas Filipinos fell 5.4 percent in July to $2.13 billion from $2.253 billion a year ago, the biggest decline in eight months since the 6.2-percent fall in November last year.
“I believe that remittances will continue growing especially because of the approaching Holiday season where overseas Filipinos usually send more money to their relatives in the Philippines,” Lim said.
Lim said the 12,000 locations nationwide were enough for MoneyGram to capture a major share of the market.
“It is not about adding locations.. In Moneygram we have extra [efforts],” Chan said.
He said Moneygram was one of the “major ones” in the business.
Moneygram, through the Moneygram Foundation, teamed up with Black Pencil Project for the School in a Box Program.
Moneygram International turned over a donation worth P1 million to the Black Pencil Project, to provide school supplies to marginalized children from indigenous communities.