THE Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) and Bank Negara Malaysia on Friday (Nov 17) jointly launched a new real-time payment systems linkage between Singapore’s PayNow and Malaysia’s DuitNow.

This will allow consumers of participating financial institutions in Singapore and Malaysia to receive and send funds of up to S$1,000 or RM3,000 daily, via one’s mobile number or virtual payment address.

The service will be made available to Singapore customers of Liquid Group, Maybank Singapore, OCBC and UOB under a phased approach, said MAS. These institutions will progressively increase the number of eligible user groups from today until end-January 2024, it added.

For users in Malaysia, the service will first be available to all CIMB, Maybank and TNG Digital users. Other financial institutions will be gradually onboarded thereafter, the central bank said.

The announcement follows the QR payment linkage announced in March this year, which enabled users to pay for products and services at merchants by scanning physical Nets or DuitNow QR codes.

“The PayNow-DuitNow linkage is the culmination of a shared aspiration by Singapore and Malaysia to facilitate cross-border payments between the two countries,” said Ravi Menon, managing director of MAS.

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“This linkage represents another step towards Asean’s vision for regional payments interconnectivity,” he added.