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Western Union (WU) Renews Ties to Extend Digital Platform

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The Western Union Company (WU - Free Report) recently expanded its longstanding ties with Texas-based Woodforest National Bank to extend both retail and digital money transfer capabilities of the former to the latter’s customers.

Courtesy of a renewed deal between the two companies, customers of Woodforest National Bank can now visit the bank’s website and mobile app to leverage WU’s online money transfer and bill-payment capabilities. Meanwhile, they will continue to have in-branch access to the same suite of services, widening their choices while conducting financial transactions.

Similar initiatives highlight Western Union’s sincere efforts to strengthen its collaboration with the Woodforest National Bank as they have jointly worked for over a decade to offer speed, options and trust to consumers for engaging in money transfer and bill-payment services. The recent move also reflects WU’s endeavor to strengthen its presence across the United States and the renewed deal with the Woodforest National Bank, operating across 17 U.S. states, bears testament to the same.

Western Union remains a preferred choice for partnership among financial service providers, courtesy of its cross-border, cross-currency platform and a worldwide financial network with an expansive reach to more than 200 countries and territories. The platform empowers customers to seamlessly transfer money to friends and family anywhere across the globe and the remittances are either delivered swiftly via a broad chain of retail locations or into billions of bank accounts, comprising millions of wallets and cards.

Such efforts made to extend both retail and online services to the Woodforest National Bank customers seem aptly timed on the part of Western Union. With the moderation of COVID-19 effects, people gained more confidence in branch visits. Yet, digital money movement remains integral to day-to-day lives owing to the convenience and speed that it provides without the need to step out of home.

WU built a solid digital arm through several digital tie-ups and substantial technology investments. Western Union has been entering into several collaborations with the global and local financial service providers, aiming to bolster the digital services portfolio, facilitating enhanced management of global payments and boosting customer experience.

Shares of Western Union have lost 10.2% year to date compared with the industry’s decline of 4.6%.

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Zacks Rank & Key Picks

Western Union currently carries a Zacks Rank #3 (Hold). Some better-ranked stocks in the Business Services space are Automatic Data Processing, Inc. (ADP - Free Report) , Visa Inc. (V - Free Report) and ICF International, Inc. (ICFI - Free Report) , each carrying a Zacks Rank of 2 (Buy). You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here.

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Visa’ earnings outpaced estimates in each of the trailing four quarters, the average being 8.81%. The Zacks Consensus Estimate for V’s 2022 earnings suggests an improvement of 25.2% from the year-ago reported figure. The same for revenues also suggests growth of 20.6% from the prior-year reading. The consensus mark for V’s 2022 earnings has moved 3.2% north in the past 30 days.

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Shares of Automatic Data Processing and ICF International have gained 5.5% and 5.6%, respectively, year to date. However, the Visa stock has lost 1% in the same time frame.

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