Ant International secures $1.2B for global payments expansion

Ant International has raised about $1.2 billion in a Series A funding round led by existing backers Ant Group and Alibaba Group, with participation from international institutional investors, to fuel global expansion and AI-enabled enhancements across its payments and fintech platforms. The Singapore-based spin-out plans to accelerate growth in merchant payments, account management and broader enterprise financial services across Asia, Europe, the Middle East and Latin America, leveraging its four business units: Alipay+, Antom, WorldFirst and Bettr. The round comes after Ant International, valued at about $10 billion, says it serves roughly 150 million merchants and 2 billion user accounts through its network. The company aims to deepen cross-border interoperability, treasury services and multi-currency processing for small and medium-sized merchants facing fragmented clearing, FX risk and compliance hurdles. Ant International’s expansion builds on its status as an overseas affiliate of Ant Group, with Alibaba’s involvement linking it to a broader e-commerce and payments ecosystem. The firm began operating independently in 2024 after regulatory moves around Ant Group, and the investment underscores continued push into global digital payments infrastructure.