Forget Google, time to end the Visa-MasterCard duopoly
1–10 of 547 posts
Re: Forget Google, time to end the Visa-MasterCard duopoly
#2Cards still account for less than 18% of US payments (source https://go.plaid.com/rs/495-WRE-561/images/Plaid-Modern-guid...).
Re: Forget Google, time to end the Visa-MasterCard duopoly
#3While I agree with the sentiment, things have certainly opened up lately quite a bit with the mainstream-ization of the crypto currencies. One could conceivably avoid Visa / MC in a way that just wouldn't have been possible before.
Visa / MC remind me a bit of Ticketmaster in that they've got parties on both sides defending them because of kickbacks. You charge the merchant the "interchange fee" plus some amount and that fee goes back to the "card issuing" bank, so they like the system.
The merchant passes on the cost (generally) to the consumer, so they don't really notice, and the ease of moving the money in 99% of cases means everyone is happy.
Re: Forget Google, time to end the Visa-MasterCard duopoly
#4I’d love to see some action here but I’m skeptical. It seems like attacking payment processors is the main avenue that the thought-crime-police use to attack alt-tech sites that don’t play ball with censoring.
If there was any mass protest movement to push change here, the media would absolutely flood the public with scare stories about (insert evil monsters here) using payment networks to finance (evil activity here) and undermine the protest movement.
It doesn’t help that so many politicians are old lawyers and activists who generally don’t have the technical knowledge to wade through the BS.
Re: Forget Google, time to end the Visa-MasterCard duopoly
#5Cards still account for less than 18% of US payments (source https://go.plaid.com/rs/495-WRE-561/images/Plaid-Modern-guid... ).
18% is freakishly huge, we're talking about the whole of the US here.
What's worse, if you look at the details, there is a swath of products that are darn near impossible to buy without a credit card.
Re: Forget Google, time to end the Visa-MasterCard duopoly
#6There is something that I've never managed to put my finger on: most companies as huge as Google / Apple / FB etc... or even more traditional ones (banks, oil, etc ...) are sort of "well known" in the sense that they do PR, they have well known figureheads, etc ...
VISA has always struck me as a very nebulous entity, whose structure, governance, is not very well know by the general public.
I wonder how they managed to grow so large while managing to keep such a conspicuously low profile.
edit: and to answer my own question, the wikipedia page is quite informative : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Visa_Inc.
Re: Forget Google, time to end the Visa-MasterCard duopoly
#7Cards still account for less than 18% of US payments (source https://go.plaid.com/rs/495-WRE-561/images/Plaid-Modern-guid... ).
18% is freakishly huge , we're talking about the whole of the US here. What's worse, if you look at the details, there is a swath of products that are darn near impossible to buy without a credit card.
And it's important to remember that ACH is typically used to:
* receive direct deposits
* pay credit card bills
* pay rent
Which represent a large amount of the value transferred vs number of transactions.
Re: Forget Google, time to end the Visa-MasterCard duopoly
#8There is something that I've never managed to put my finger on: most companies as huge as Google / Apple / FB etc... or even more traditional ones (banks, oil, etc ...) are sort of "well known" in the sense that they do PR, they have well known figureheads, etc ... VISA has always struck me as a very nebulous entity, whose structure, governance, is not very well know by the general public. I wonder how they managed t…
I think they were an "association" until the spun out into a company in their own right recently.
https://money.cnn.com/2008/03/21/news/companies/visabanks/in...
Re: Forget Google, time to end the Visa-MasterCard duopoly
#9Having worked in fintech, they're essentially the gatekeepers of any new technology. Have a great idea for a value add in the payment processing gateway? They will not let you on any platform for 4 years while they launch a (poor) competitor at scale.
Re: Forget Google, time to end the Visa-MasterCard duopoly
#10There is something that I've never managed to put my finger on: most companies as huge as Google / Apple / FB etc... or even more traditional ones (banks, oil, etc ...) are sort of "well known" in the sense that they do PR, they have well known figureheads, etc ... VISA has always struck me as a very nebulous entity, whose structure, governance, is not very well know by the general public. I wonder how they managed t…
If you make $10B/year on revenue of $20B/year (great margin at that scale) you keep quiet I think for good reason :)