Headline: Ant International raises ~$1.2B Series A as Ant Group and Alibaba back global push — with blockchain, stablecoins and AI front and center
Ant International has closed a roughly $1.2 billion Series A round, securing capital from Ant Group, Alibaba, existing shareholders and unnamed global investment firms to accelerate its overseas fintech expansion and beef up AI and blockchain-powered payments.
What the funding will do
- Grow Ant International’s footprint across Asia, Europe, the Middle East and Latin America.
- Increase investment in artificial intelligence and AI-driven fintech products.
- Expand cross-border payment services, global accounts and inclusive fintech solutions for merchants operating internationally.
Who’s backing it
- The round included participation from Ant Group and several existing shareholders including Alibaba; the company has not publicly named the external investors. Chinese outlet Yicai first reported details of the financing.
Context and momentum
- The Singapore-based unit has been a focal point of Ant Group’s overseas strategy since a March 2024 reorganization that spun several divisions into independently governed businesses. Eric Jing (chairman), Yang Peng (CEO) and Douglas Feagin (president) lead Ant International.
- Bloomberg previously said Ant International explored raising about $1 billion earlier this year at a valuation of at least $10 billion after recording eight consecutive profitable quarters.
Scale and product mix
- Ant International says its network connects more than 150 million merchants with over 2 billion consumer accounts through operational and settlement hubs in Shanghai, Hong Kong, Singapore and Malaysia.
- Its business is organized into four operating units: Alipay+, merchant payments platform Antom, cross-border financial services provider WorldFirst, and Bettr, which builds AI-powered treasury and fintech solutions.
Blockchain, stablecoins and cross-border rails — why crypto people should care
- Ant International operates Whale, its blockchain platform that supports tokenized settlement and payments infrastructure. The company reported processing more than $1 trillion in global transactions during 2024, with roughly one-third of payments settled via blockchain.
- Alipay+ runs in over 100 markets and enables consumers to pay with existing digital wallets while merchants settle locally — an infrastructure that’s increasingly being paired with blockchain rails.
- The firm integrated Circle’s USDC into parts of its cross-border settlement network earlier this year, enabling selected transactions to settle over blockchain rails rather than traditional correspondent banking.
- Bloomberg reported Ant International generated an estimated $3.7 billion in revenue in 2025 (about a 25% year-over-year increase), accounting for roughly one-tenth of Ant Group’s total revenue but growing faster than some domestic businesses.
- Ant International has also signaled regulatory ambitions for stablecoins: Bloomberg said it plans to seek fiat-referenced stablecoin issuer licenses in Hong Kong, Singapore and Luxembourg, with a confirmed intent to apply in Hong Kong after the city’s Stablecoins Ordinance took effect.
Partnerships and pilots
- The company has trialed tokenized liquidity transfers and settlements with partners including Standard Chartered, running pilots under Hong Kong’s Ensemble Sandbox and Singapore dollar-denominated blockchain liquidity transfers.
Bottom line
This $1.2 billion raise cements Ant International as Ant Group’s global engine — scaling merchant payments, expanding blockchain settlement rails, and positioning regulated stablecoins and AI as strategic pillars. For the crypto ecosystem, the move signals deeper institutional adoption of blockchain-based cross-border settlement and growing competition among regulated stablecoin issuers at the international level.
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