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1、Digital-paymentservicesaremultiplyingintheMiddleEast数字支付在中东长势正猛Sep1st2012
2、BEIRUT
3、fromtheprinteditionAfewyearsagoWahidEssale’sfriendsinSaudiArabiastartedtouseonlineshoppingsites.Butwhenitcametobuying,theywouldaskhimforhiscreditcard.“I’dpayforthegoodsandtheygavemebackthecash,plusasm
4、allcommission,”heexplains.By2007MrEssalehadturnedthefavourintoabusiness:Cashna,anelectronicwalletwhichallowsuserstostorefundsonlineandspendthemone-commercesites.几年前,瓦希德•伊萨尔的朋友们就开始上购物网站了,不过一旦要买,他们就得向瓦希德要信用卡。“我去付货款,他们拿现金还我,外加一小点佣金。”伊萨尔解释道。到了2007年,伊萨尔已经把这个给朋友帮的忙变成了一桩事业,即Cashna。Cashna
5、是一种电子钱包,它能让用户在线上存款,并在电子商务网站上使用这些存款。CashnaisonlyoneofaslewofnewpaymentservicesintheMiddleEast.CashU,theregion’smostpopulare-wallet,handlespaymentsforthelikesofSkypeandAlJazeeraSports.OneCard,anothere-wallet,canbetoppedupinmanyways,includingwithscratchcardssoldbystreetvendors.Gate2P
6、layhasgatheredregionalpaymentservicesandWesternones—PayPal,MasterCardandVisa—underonevirtualroof;merchantsonlyhavetoconnecttoGate2Playtoaccessthemall.Cashna不过是中东新兴支付服务大潮中的一员。当地最流行的电子钱包CashU能够为Skype和半岛电视台体育频道之类产品付费。另一种电子钱包OneCard则可以通过多种途径充值,用从路边小贩卖的刮刮卡交费便是其中一种。Gate2Play则将当地支付服务和西方同
7、类产品----如Paypal,MasterCard和Visa----整合到了同一虚拟平台之上,商家只要登录Gate2play便可以享受所有这些服务。Thebloomofsuchservicesistheresultofamismatchofdemandandsupply.ThankstothespreadofinternetconnectionsandsmartphonesintheMiddleEastandnorthAfrica,consumersareincreasinglyeagertoshopandplayonline.Yetmostofthere
8、gion’s370mpeopleuseonlycash.Andevenwhentheyhaveacreditcard,theyseldomtrustmerchantswiththeirpaymentdetails,saysRamezShehadiofBooz&Company,aconsultancy.Asaresult,electronicpaymentsareonlyasmallshareofallpayments(seechart).这类服务的繁盛是由供需不协调引起的。因特网与智能手机在中东和北非的扩展使得消费者越来越希望在网上购物消遣,而当地3.7亿
9、人之中的大多数都还只能使用现金。而且就算他们有信用卡,他们也很少会把自己的支付明细交托给商家,博斯咨询公司的RamezShehadi这样说道。因此,电子支付只占支付总数的一小部分。GovernmentsaroundtheGulffirsttriedtochangethisbylaunchingsystemsthatlinkbanksandbillers.SaudiArabia’sSADAD,forinstance,allowsthekingdom’scitizenstomakepaymentstolocalcompanies.Butsuchservices
10、havenotbeenkeentoincludeonlinegam