Ant Group

Alipay wants to leverage the millions of Chinese customers who travel abroad by offering them services in different parts of the world.

Ant Financial raised its agreed offer for MoneyGram International Inc. by 36 percent as the financial-services company controlled by Chinese billionaire Jack Ma tries to top a competing offer and overcome security concerns.

As more of China's citizens engage in travel and commerce across the nation's borders, more companies want to help them pay and collect money. Many of China's dominant payment brands are extending their reach globally, but U.S. and European companies are also focused on this audience.

China-based Ant Financial is preparing to fight for MoneyGram despite a rival bid from Euronet Worldwide, based on signals the company sent today in an open letter to the money-transfer company’s management, employees and customers.

Ant Financial said it’s considering whether to make a higher offer for U.S. money-transfer firm MoneyGram International Inc., after that company said an unsolicited takeover bid by a smaller, little-known rival could be a better deal.

JD.com Inc. agreed to sell its finance arm for 14.3 billion yuan ($2.1 billion) in cash while retaining a share of its future profits, part of a deal to spin off the fast-growing division and create a strong rival to billionaire Jack Ma’s Ant Financial.

Ant Financial, the parent of China’s largest online payment service, is seeking to raise less than $3 billion by issuing debt to fund its acquisitions, people familiar with the matter said.

To date, Ant's Alipay has been comparable to PayPal, seldom venturing beyond payments. The financial products Alipay plans to pursue as it enters new markets put it more firmly in direct competition with mainstream banks.

Alipay's deal to buy MoneyGram for $880 million may be the centerpiece of its strategy to expand beyond China's borders, but it's not its first move in recent months. The Alibaba payments affiliate has already extended its reach in several other ways.

The U.S.-to-China payments corridor is one of the biggest in the world, according to the most recent World Bank data. It is dwarfed only by the U.S.-to-Mexico corridor, which the Trump campaign targeted as part of its border wall plan.