China UnionPay (CUP), the lone national bank card payment network in China, has teamed up with Rizal Commercial Banking Corp. (RCBC), one of the Philippines biggest commercial banks, to launch a credit card operations in the Philippines, RCBC said Friday.

Oscar Biason, president of RCBC's credit card subsidiary Bankard Inc., said that in the next three to six months, the RCBC and CUP will issue a CUP-branded credit card targeting Chinese from Chinese mainland frequently traveling to the Philippines for business, leisure or study.

Biason and visiting regional officials of CUP Thursday announced merchant acquiring agreement that would allow over 1.2 billion CUP cardholders to use their card while traveling to the Philippines and shop in Bankard-accredited merchants.

"With more Chinese tourists visiting Philippines each year, retailers who offer CUP card acceptance facilities will be able to attract new customers and stronger sales from these visiting Chinese tourists,"RCBC chair Helen Dee said in a press statement.

The deal with RCBC and Bankard is part of the efforts of CUP, the world's largest credit card issuer, to establish its brand globally. This is the first deal of its kind between CUP and a Philippine bank. RCBC and Bankard will use its existing relationship with various merchants for MasterCard, Visa and JCB to make these available to cardholders of CUP.

CUP was established in Shanghai in 2002 with the approval of the State Council and the People's Bank of China to serve as the country's main bank card payment association. It was tasked to spearhead efforts to establish unified standards and regulations in China's card payment industry and operate an inter-bank transaction settlement system.

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