As emerging countries take on a more prominent role in shaping the global agenda, the need to strengthen a movement that has advanced significantly over the past decade becomes even more evident: strategic cooperation among these nations. In two weeks, at the 17th BRICS Summit, rising economies will gather for another round of collaboration. It is through the exchange of experiences and knowledge that some of the most impactful payment solutions of the past decade have emerged.
A prime example is the recent launch of Pix Automático in Brazil, the host of this year’s BRICS Summit. The group, now composed of 11 emerging economies, represents 49% of the world’s population. Pix Automático, the new feature of Brazil’s wildly popular instant payment system Pix, enables recurring purchases and marks a major step forward in modernizing the country’s economy and promoting financial inclusion.
In a nation where over 60 million people don’t have a credit card, but more than 170 million already use Pix, this innovation allows a significant share of the population to access services and products previously limited to cardholders. According to EBANX’s annual study Beyond Borders 2025, Pix Automático is expected to unlock more than USD 30 billion in e-commerce alone within its first two years of operation. This growth will be driven primarily by consumers who are being newly included in the digital economy thanks to this feature.
While wealthier nations focus on optimizing long-established payment systems, rising economies must overcome more fundamental challenges: low banking penetration, the need to build accessible and efficient infrastructure, and fostering trust in digital platforms, especially in environments where cash remains dominant. It was from these needs, combined with a growing base of digital consumers, that solutions like Pix in Brazil and UPI in India were created.
What has been happening in Brazil since 2020, when Pix was launched, began in India in 2016 with the creation of UPI, which became the most widely used instant payment method in the world. The technology and processes established by the Asian country caused cash usage to plummet from 80% in 2021 to 52% last year, according to a Reserve Bank of India (RBI) study referenced in Beyond Borders 2025. In digital commerce, where UPI already accounts for 55% of all purchases in India, the volume transacted through this method alone will exceed USD 150 billion annually by 2027, per Payments and Commerce Market Intelligence (PCMI) in EBANX’s study.
These numbers caught the attention of Brazilian authorities, who reached out to their BRICS partner to understand how to follow the same path. The collaboration resulted in Pix. In less than five years, 91% of Brazil’s adult population is already using the payment method, and just last year, nearly USD 140 billion were transacted through the system. Pix is now the second most-used instant payment method on the planet, behind UPI. Together, they represent more than 60% of all real-time transactions worldwide, according to the ACI Worldwide report.
The main characteristics of UPI are present in Pix: instantaneous processing, 24/7 availability, free usage for individuals, and robust infrastructure to support high transaction volumes. With the launch of Pix Automático, both now have recurring payment features—UPI AutoPay arrived in 2020. Although both methods share many similarities, there are important differences because, ultimately, each method was developed to serve the characteristics of local consumers.
One of the most visible differences lies in the user interaction layer. While Brazilians typically access Pix through their own banks’ apps, they can also use digital wallets. In India, however, users rely heavily on intermediary platforms like PhonePe, Paytm, and Google Pay—in practice, they use just one app regardless of how many bank accounts they have. Another difference is in user identification: Brazilians can use email, phone number, tax ID, or a random code as an association key; Indians have a virtual payment address (VPAs), which is often linked to their mobile number. Merchant fee policies also differ: in Brazil, the amount depends on the payment provider; in India, these fees only apply to specific modalities, such as prepaid transactions.
Being about to complete 10 years, compared to Pix’s nearly five, UPI has more features that make it even more comprehensive. One is offline payment, which allows users to make transactions even without internet access, just by dialling and selecting different options on an interactive voice response number. Another is recurring billing based on consumption (on-demand), not just time-based (monthly, semi-annual, or annual, for example). A third difference is cross-border capability: while the Central Bank of Brazil hasn’t yet launched an international feature for Pix, UPI is used in eight countries: India, Bhutan, France, Mauritius, Nepal, Singapore, Sri Lanka, and the United Arab Emirates.
Similar functionalities to those of UPI are already being developed for Pix by the Central Bank of Brazil, including both offline and international transactions. In the case of usage abroad, although there isn’t yet a specific feature for this, some players have built solutions that allow Brazilian consumers to make purchases overseas using the instant payment method.
Pix product roadmap also focuses on applications that aren’t part of the Indian reality, such as installment payments, a characteristic Brazilian habit. The so-called Pix Parcelado is set to be launched by the end of the year with the expectation of further boosting the country’s digital commerce. Internal EBANX data shows that global companies already offering installments in Brazil through other payment methods record 40% weekly revenue growth sustained for six months. This happens because installments increase average transaction values.
Emerging markets, including Brazil and India, lead global growth in new digital consumers. And Pix and UPI are directly related to this movement. By 2034, nearly 700 million people in these regions will enter the “consumer class,” causing e-commerce volume to exceed the USD 1 trillion mark in Latin America by 2027—with 55% of that in Brazil alone. In India, this volume will reach USD 274 billion in the same period.
The extremely successful experiences of Brazil and India are catching the attention of various emerging countries. Colombia, for example, will launch its instant payment system next month. Bre-B is entirely based on the technology and learnings from Pix and UPI. Egypt and South Africa, two other BRICS members, are also drawing inspiration from what Brazilians and Indians have accomplished.
Cooperation based on technological solutions developed by those who best understand the common challenges of these markets is vital for the development of emerging countries, which together are becoming protagonists of the next digital revolution. Integration among rising economies is a promising path toward more equitable and sustainable growth.
