MoneyGram International is looking to accelerate its growth in Saudi Arabia and Russia by double-digits.

MoneyGram International, the world's second largest company in the global payment services, is looking to accelerate its growth in the region by double-digits.

In an exclusive interview with Emirates Business, Pamela Patsley, Chairman and CEO of MoneyGram, said its Middle East operations have not kept up with the regional market growth.

"The Middle East is an important and growing part of our business, but relative to our whole portfolio it is below what it should be vis-a-vis the size of the market," Patsley said.

"Without specifying a timeframe, I would like to see us reach double-digit growth in transactions. After that we hope to see double-digit revenue growth and we'll continue to increase our current four-and-a-half or five per cent market share."

The company, which boasts a global network of 186,000 agent locations, plans to beef up its presence in the region by increasing the number of its partner agents and introducing new products this year.

This is an expansionary move from its biggest market, the United States, to other major countries in the money remittance business, several of them in oil-producing regions.

"Saudi Arabia is the second largest remitting country in the world. Overall this region offers tremendous growth for the global remittance business," Patsley said. "The third largest country in terms of the number of transactions is Russia. Saudi Arabia and Russia both hold tremendous opportunities."