Category Archives: Retail

US Payments – Where to Invest

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New Payment Experiences

Topics today (pardon the typos)

  • Are US payments still an attractive area for investment and growth? If so, where are the opportunities?

  • High level view of the payment landscape and areas of friction

  • Consumer Journey –  how to unlock new consumer experiences

  • Where will innovation come from? 

  • Core areas for improvement?

  • Who are the best providers? Wallets as the new metaphor

  • Challenges with Issuer-led innovation (ie PAZE)

The top questions coming out of Money 2020 were: is the US payments environment maturing? Are there still opportunities for break out growth? Where? Who is best positioned and why?  Today I will be taking part of that on. 

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Separating Payment and Identity

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15 pages (summary is 4)

Follow blog from Payment Authorization – Under the Hood (ie working on a car engine), Trust Assertions – Identity will Define the Future of Payments and Role of Identity and Trust in eCommerce.

Today’s blog is one of my personal favorites, not only because of the topic but because of the leading experts in retail, identity, networks, and payments that collaborated and provided editing (thanks all). While I’m no longer the tech expert, I do have a unique view on the “inside baseball” incentives and realities of what is actually happening (behind the rules). Payments are not like a brand-new Ferrari operating to spec, they are a very messy business with complex rules, worn-out systems, unresponsive drivers and a broke racing team with no sponsor. This is a get-your-hands-dirty blog. Note that I’m open to feedback in case I’ve missed something

Outline

  1. Summary

  2. Survey of global identity initiatives

  3. How identity works in eCommerce today

  4. Technical example

  5. How identity improves CX and eCommerce payment flows

  6. Four future scenarios of identity and payments

  7. What should investors track

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MRC Recap – Looking up – A Retailers Perspective On Payments

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I’m glad I made the decision to attend my very first Merchant Risk Council event this week. For those that don’t know, MRC Vegas is the second largest payment event in the US (after M2020) but with a VERY different focus. MRC is attended by the “hands on” payment leaders from all the top merchants and the vendors that serve them: Stripe, Adyen, PayPal, V, MA, risk, fraud,  …. Etc. Whereas M2020 is attended by FinTech, Crypto, Venture, Institutional investor, and strategy audiences, MRC is much more focused on making payments work. 

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Driving Vision of Durbin? Bi-Lateral Connections?

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I now have 70% confidence in the forces shaping Durbin (still no threat to V/MA). 

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BNPL Travel Example – Short Blog

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Short blog today on an example BNPL opportunity and the differences between a consumer BNPL solution like Apple Pay Later and Merchant integrated solutions from providers such as Affirm (or SQ/Afterpay see Three Flavors of BNPL).  Today Air Travel and Vacation packages are the focus.

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eCom Innovation Success – Shop Pay

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Short blog as follow up to yesterday’s blog on Acceptance Hurdles in eCommerce. Successful innovation requires a great new customer experience and/or economic model. The most recent success in the US is Shopify’s Shop Pay.

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Role of Identity and Trust in eCom

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Please excuse typos.. Editing not complete. I had a great compliment this week: “Tom you write so dense.. why are you so different”? I’m not an analyst or a blogger, but a guy that has run operational businesses and led venture investments. The only great thing I’ve ever done in life is to meet great people with passion and ability to execute on a vision. This blog is how I chat with all my colleagues. Glad others find it useful..

This is a rather long blog.. if you don’t have time read the wrap up at the end which is a summary of key points.

—————–

Continuing on from yesterday’s blog on Authentify – Bank ID Service, I thought I would outline the role of identity in eCommerce and the problems to be solved. Although most of you know me as a payments guy, I also have deep roots in data working directly with retailers, AdTech, Google/FB and media (in addition to issuers/acquirers/networks). In looking through eCommerce articles I couldn’t find one relating to identity (from a big picture perspective).. So I thought I would write one.

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Walmart Pay

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Background

As I’ve stated before, there are 3 industrys that enable mobile payments: grocery, gas, transit (frequency of use). Given WMT’s scale, consumer loyalty, mobile success, cards on file and acceptance cost efficiencies this is a no brainer. My summary is that they have used their unique assets in a new and innovative way, with superb timing.

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