3 Non-Bank Payment Players to Watch
Facebook/WhatsApp
Many people were taken aback by the staggering $19 billion Facebook shelled out to acquire mobile messaging service WhatsApp in March. It's possible Facebook was paying more for what the messaging service could become in the future than for what it is worth just now.
While WhatsApp is not currently designed to manage mobile payments in any way, many industry insiders ultimately say that is the endgame for the four-year-old company. With 300 million active users, who send 11 billion messages per day, Whatsapp could easily become the worlds largest P2P payments provider if it could seamlessly integrate payments into its platform.
Bryan Yurcan is associate editor for Bank Systems and Technology. He has worked in various editorial capacities for newspapers and magazines for the past 8 years. After beginning his career as a municipal and courts reporter for daily newspapers in upstate New York, Bryan has ... View Full Bio
Tweet This