FINANCIAL technology (fintech) start-up Qwikwire has tied up with Satoshi Citadel Industries (SCI), one of the biggest blockchain companies in the Philippines, for the development of Asia’s pioneering real-estate listing platform Aqwire to start processing crypto payments, which are expected to reach $30 million or P1.60 billion by the end of 2018.

With various countries adopting the use of bitcoins and other crypto currencies as payment options, coupled with the increase need in property space, whether residential or commercial, leveraging on these trends is a smart decision the company has so far made, according to Qwikwire Founder and CEO Ray Refundo.

Such a significant amount of payments that they can potentially deal with once Aqwire is up and running, he revealed, actually comes from the demand of overseas-based customers of their real-estate development partners.

“We have been getting requests from a lot of our [customers’] clients in Japan and South Korea to be able to pay by Bitcoin or Ethereum. So that’s why we’re partnering with SCI and their platform called Reddit,” he told reporters during their contract signing held recently at the Acceler8 Coworking Space in Makati City.

The so-called “tokenization of the economy” phenomenon has been apparent in these two countries, wherein about 50 percent to 60 percent of the entire cryptocurrencies volume in trade happen.

“The market cap is about 200 [percent] through digital in any given time. And we can only imagine [how big] like these Koreans and these Japanese have been paying in cryptocurrencies and then they make some profits out of it,” noted SCI CEO John Bailon.

As the first international property marketplace, Aqwire will allow developers and brokers to be able to sell properties to foreign buyers.

Powered by smart contract applications, it will facilitate the different steps in a real-estate transaction, from developers worldwide listing their units for sale to buyers settling their monthly dues in perpetuity.

Likewise, Aqwire gives out different analytical data to help potential buyers with their purchasing decision.

Different conventional channels comprise its robust payment processing capabilities, such as credit/debit cards, international bank transfers and SWIFT.

Qwikwire has already processed $16 million worth of real-estate payments in the past couple of years since its inception.

“We collect payments from anyone in the world,” Refundo said of the foreign property buyers they serve, mostly from the United States who account for about 40 percent of their collection volume, and the rest coming from the United Arab Emirates and other Middle East countries, as well as Japan, South Korea, Singapore and the United Kingdom.

Adding a crypto payments gateway, through SCI, is seen helpful to further strengthen the platform and achieve the premium value targeted by the company to handle this year.

Their partnership, Bailon pointed out, bridges the gap by collecting from foreign buyers’ profits in crypto currency the payments for their purchased real-estate property in the Philippines.

“And [it] allows them to do this in a bank sense and a regulated manner,” he added, while citing SCI’s credential as one of the first established blockchain firms in the country.

Currently, there are around 160 real-estate companies in the Philippines. Less than 10 of them, however, market their properties overseas.

Not privy of their exact allocation for this, though, Refundo bared that “it’s prohibitively expensive” per most players.

Since Qwikwire provides them a single platform, he emphasized that their real-estate needs are met, and everyone is satisfied with the ecosystem that they have created.

On the buyers’ part, the top executive projected that they could save between 20 percent and 30 percent when purchasing and paying dues for the property they bought through the first global property marketplace powered by the blockchain.

This is because traditional modes of payment through credit card or bank transfer take time and add cost to the process, Qwikwire Chief Blockchain Developer Scott Dy reasoned out.

“I think the partnership itself can eliminate a lot of the frictions, especially in doing crossborder [payments]. By opening up crypto capabilities, we’ll be able to process payments for more buyers,” he explained. “So time as well as middle fee reduction are what we’re seeing [as their gains] by switching [to the platform].”

Currently, there are three local property developers onboard the Qwikwire’s platform, and more will be enlisted alongside global players.

The crypto payments gateway is the first of a series of products that the company will introduce based on blockchain.

“We’re going to launch other applications afterwards,” disclosed Refundo. “I think we’re starting with bitcoin and Ethereum and, eventually, we’ll have Litecoin, depending with SCI.”

While the fintech firm is entrenching itself initially in the Philippines, it also seeks to expand to other markets in Southeast Asia, particularly in Thailand and Vietnam in the fourth quarter of this year.

This is in line with Qwikwire’s goal to tap at least 5 percent or $20 billion of the entire $400-billion cross-border real-estate industry.

“The market is huge. If you go to Hong Kong, you go to Bangkok, they also do a lot of cross-border real estate. It’s big. The difference is in the Philippines, most of the foreign payments that we receive from abroad are coming from overseas Filipino workers who buy properties in the Philippines. That is like 80 percent of our market,” he said.

“By Hong Kong, in Singapore [or] in Bangkok, the payments they receive are from foreigners who buy properties in their countries. [The] Philippines is still small. We need to get a big chunk of this pie,” he stressed.