Paypal CEO Dan Schulman announced that the company has acquired a majority stake in Guofubao Information Technology Co., making it the first foreign payments platform to win government approval to provide online payments in China.

Paypal Information Technologies Co. acquired a 70% stake in the firm that operates under the GoPay brand. Schulman said the company looks forward to partnering with China's financial institutions and technology platforms,' adding that the company will provide services to consumers and businesses in China and overseas markets.

Talie Baker, senior analyst at the Aite Group, said the deal is a 'pretty big thing' for PayPal as the Chinese market is one of the biggest in the world. 

"Not only will they better support  [cross] border and ecommerce, but they may be able to also tackle the Chinese tourism market that many companies are trying to solve for — e.g. Alipay trying to by MoneyGram to support Chinese consumers traveling abroad and needing to make payments."

The deal is set to close by the fourth quarter. 

Cover image courtesy of Paypal.