Paypal is the primary global online payment network and a secure mechanism for two parties to send money to one another. There are millions of users on it worldwide, and most of them are freelancers. Since PayPal entered the global market, freelancers all over the world have been using this safe method of money transfer, with many Asian freelancers citing it as the simplest approach overall. Unfortunately, the Pakistani market was not introduced to this amazing payment gateway. Though there has been some conjecture regarding PayPal’s potential arrival into the Pakistani market, the wait is finally over as PayPal will be entering the country through a third-party strategic relationship.
Umar Saif, Pakistan’s acting minister of information technology, announced via a video link that PayPal will begin operating independently in conjunction with third-party payment processor Payoneer. According to sources, Payoneer has enabled its users in Pakistan to utilize PayPal as a money transfer service in order to make payments, much like Payoneer does.
In the meantime, it means that users have registered using Payoneer and cannot open their accounts directly on PayPal. This announcement was just the counterproductive of speculation about bringing PayPal to Pakistan.
The question is why PayPal is reluctant to enter the Pakistani market. This question has been debated many times as the country has continuously increased the number of freelancers and marked the fourth largest country in terms of the number of freelancers. In recent years, the topic of introducing PayPal to Pakistan has dominated policy discussions among all IT ministers.
Speculation of PayPal entry into the Pakistani market has erupted country-wise, as in September 2023, caretaker minister Umar Saif said that his ministry is actively working on bringing PayPal and other major safe money transaction systems into Pakistan due to the massive number of demands, but since then, there have been no active steps to be taken or work to be done at the government level. The reason is that PayPal has major concerns like regulatory restrictions, money laundering, fraudulent activities, capital flight, and Financial Action Task Force (FATF) restrictions.