THE DEVELOPED countries have been left behind by China in the development of a cashless society. It is predicted that mobile payments will soon replace card payments as the most common payment method worldwide, something that has already been realized in some big cities in China. Beijing Youth Daily comments:

Baidu, China's largest search engine, and Jingdong, one of the country's largest e-commerce companies, are following the lead of China's two internet giants Alibaba and Tencent in actively developing mobile payment services for use at home and abroad.

China's mobile payment business is already expanding around the world at a fast pace. Alipay, the third-party mobile and online payment platform established by Alibaba, can now be used in 33 countries and regions. While WeChat Pay, a similar payment platform owned by Tencent, is available in 13 countries and regions.