The Argentine multinational company Mercado Libre wants to have the largest digital bank in Mexico.

“We see huge opportunities for Mercado Pago in Mexico. In June, we announced our intention to apply for a banking license, which will allow us to scale the business to achieve our ambition to be the number one digital bank in the country,” the company said in its most recent financial report. 

This ecosystem will be key to its strategy. It has already proven to be an important contributor to Mercado Pago’s progress in Mexico. 

Mercado Pago is the largest Fintech in terms of monthly active users (MAUs). 

In addition, it has a profitable loan portfolio that exceeded $1.5 billion in the second quarter of 2024.

The influx of users to Mercado Pago reinforces its central position in financial services. 

MAUs increased 37% year-on-year to 52 million in 2Q2024.

Digital bank

Mercado Libre sees higher levels of engagement in Argentina, Brazil and Mexico, with heavy users growing at a faster pace and the number of products per user increasing steadily. 

Last August 13, Mercado Libre projected it will have more than 24,000 employees by the end of 2024 in Mexico.

The company also plans to invest US$2.45 billion in Mexico by 2024, a year-on-year increase of 48 percent.

Strategy

The company offers its users an ecosystem of six integrated e-commerce and digital finance services: 

• Mercado Libre Marketplace.
• Mercado Pago Fintech platform. 
• Mercado Envíos logistics service.
• Mercado Ads solution.
• Mercado Libre Classifieds service.
• Mercado Shops online stores solution.

To complement Mercado Libre’s Marketplace and improve the user experience, Mercado Pago, an integrated digital payment solution, was developed. 

Initially, Mercado Pago was designed to facilitate transactions in Mercado Libre’s Marketplaces through a mechanism that allowed its users to send and receive payments securely, easily and quickly. 

Over time, Mercado Pago has become a complete ecosystem of financial technology solutions, both in the digital and physical world.

In addition, this digital payment solution allows any registered user of Mercado Libre to send and receive digital payments securely and easily, as well as to pay for purchases made in any of Mercado Libre’s Marketplaces. 

Currently, Mercado Pago processes and settles all transactions in its Marketplaces in Argentina, Brazil, Mexico, Colombia, Chile, Uruguay, Peru and Ecuador.