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Visa and Mastercard: The global payment duopoly (2024)

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Re: Visa and Mastercard: The global payment duopoly (2024)

#21

Post by mschuster91 »

krapp wrote: post #9
everyone wrote: post #3

The fucked up thing is how they are enforcing archaic puritan ideals on the whole world. Acting as self appointed global censors. (Eg. not allowing adult games on Steam or Itch.io) The most confusing thing for me is why. I have read a few theories, but nothing convincing. What could be a strong enough motivator to do such a bizarre thing? Also we need governments to keep them in line. We cant have private corps actin…

>What could be a strong enough motivator to do such a bizarre thing? Money. The only two motivators for a capitalist entity are making money and avoiding any government interference with making more money. They certainly aren't doing it out of Christian principles.

> They certainly aren't doing it out of Christian principles.

Said Evangelicals unfortunately know how to raise a stink, and with stinks comes bad press or, even worse, haphazard attempts to regulate stuff. Or, under Trump, it might draw the ire of the Dear Leader himself and suddenly even a company like MC/Visa finds itself in hot water.

Either of these results is expensive, much more a cost risk than the profit of something like Itch is worth.

Re: Visa and Mastercard: The global payment duopoly (2024)

#22

Post by cbzoiav »

itake wrote: post #15
pavlov wrote: post #13

The credit card duopoly is another instance where the EU has done a good job with regulation, but everyone just takes it for granted until they’re reminded how much worse the rest of the world has it. In the EU, card payment fees are capped at 0.2% for debit cards and 0.3% for credit cards. In the US, these interchange fees are about 2%. US businesses pay over $100 billion annually in these fees to card networks. If…

Is there information on EU vs US credit limits? How do the account fees compare between EU and US?

Most credit cards in the UK at least (same cap) have no standard account fee. Those that do come with other perks / beyond the 'world elite' etc side Mastercard/visa aren't seeing that money - its going to the issuing bank. Bank accounts also generaly have no standard fees (and a lot of other things we take forgranted - faster payments (if I send money to a friend/business I can do it instantly for free without needing a third party solution), standing orders, direct debit etc. - that make banking far easier than in the US).

There is also regulation in place that restricts predatory fee practices, getting customers into revolving debt and protection that makes card issuers liable for purchases (Section 75 - e.g. if I order something paying with my credit card and the merchant doesn't pay, the card issuer is legally liable / I can claim from them and its on them to get it from the merchant)

Re: Visa and Mastercard: The global payment duopoly (2024)

#23

Post by alexriddle »

itake wrote: post #15
pavlov wrote: post #13

The credit card duopoly is another instance where the EU has done a good job with regulation, but everyone just takes it for granted until they’re reminded how much worse the rest of the world has it. In the EU, card payment fees are capped at 0.2% for debit cards and 0.3% for credit cards. In the US, these interchange fees are about 2%. US businesses pay over $100 billion annually in these fees to card networks. If…

Is there information on EU vs US credit limits? How do the account fees compare between EU and US?

Other than Amex for airline points I don’t spend a penny on banking, all the standard services (eg transfers, bill payments, cash withdrawals, deposits) are free (in the U.K.) with no monthly fee.

Re: Visa and Mastercard: The global payment duopoly (2024)

#24

Post by sdeframond »

colesantiago wrote: post #16

So what is the solution to this duopoly except for crypto? I envision a third payment processor that isn't Visa or Mastercard and not even crypto. It isn't Stripe or PayPal either, something completely different. Thoughts?

Hmm, Carte Bleue ?

Edit: oh, that's Visa Europe now...

Re: Visa and Mastercard: The global payment duopoly (2024)

#25

Post by lillecarl »

itake wrote: post #15
pavlov wrote: post #13

The credit card duopoly is another instance where the EU has done a good job with regulation, but everyone just takes it for granted until they’re reminded how much worse the rest of the world has it. In the EU, card payment fees are capped at 0.2% for debit cards and 0.3% for credit cards. In the US, these interchange fees are about 2%. US businesses pay over $100 billion annually in these fees to card networks. If…

Is there information on EU vs US credit limits? How do the account fees compare between EU and US?

I pay 3€ per month to "Nordea" for "unlimited" accounts and one VISA debit card.

Re: Visa and Mastercard: The global payment duopoly (2024)

#26

Post by Telemakhos »

topdan wrote: post #12

China is a footnote in the article, but their story here is interesting. China's WTO accession commitments in 2001 agreed to open its financial services sector, including payment card services, to foreign companies, except they never did. The US sued (presumably on behalf of VISA and MasterCard) and won in 2012: https://ustr.gov/about-us/policy-offices/press-office/press-... MasterCard just started being full offered…

Not only have they avoided the duopoly: they've avoided dependence on US tech and US financial surveillance/control. The EU depends on Visa/Mastercard for cross-border transactions especially, and they've never been able to get their act together well enough to establish a home-grown, EU-wide payment rails system that would give them independence from US processors should they need that independence. That's a lesson that Russia learned back in 2014 and remedied with its Mir rails.

Re: Visa and Mastercard: The global payment duopoly (2024)

#27

Post by frankfrank13 »

in like 2011 I saw Daniel Radcliffe in How to succeed in business without really trying, and there's this line

> And other men may carry cards, as members of the Diners

that i did not understand until a few years ago someone mention the show, I remembered the line. And now at this moment, where this article reminded me of the Capital One acq. of Discover which happened to own Diner's, I can't help but think of this zombified credit card company limping along.

Sign me up for the Diner's platinum, which I have to assume will get 5x points at the five-and-dime.

Re: Visa and Mastercard: The global payment duopoly (2024)

#28

Post by drdrey »

colesantiago wrote: post #16

So what is the solution to this duopoly except for crypto? I envision a third payment processor that isn't Visa or Mastercard and not even crypto. It isn't Stripe or PayPal either, something completely different. Thoughts?

why not crypto? stablecoins could be a credible answer to this problem

Re: Visa and Mastercard: The global payment duopoly (2024)

#29

Post by 867-5309 »

pavlov wrote: post #13

The credit card duopoly is another instance where the EU has done a good job with regulation, but everyone just takes it for granted until they’re reminded how much worse the rest of the world has it. In the EU, card payment fees are capped at 0.2% for debit cards and 0.3% for credit cards. In the US, these interchange fees are about 2%. US businesses pay over $100 billion annually in these fees to card networks. If…

that's only a very recent change, and not universally rolled out. for decades shops charged ~£3 "connection fee" for paying by credit card, no matter the purchase amount, and many still (probably illegally) enforce a minimum spend if paying by credit or debit card. like when paying or withdrawing money abroad, it's just a lottery as to the "fees" you'll be charged not because there are such fees, but because someone in the '70s created super advanced tech to detect usage outside the country of issuance, and everyone got used to that

Re: Visa and Mastercard: The global payment duopoly (2024)

#30

Post by rprend »

Speaking as someone who tried (and failed) to build a competitor, merchants don’t actually care about the fees. We built a mobile payment system using bank transfer rails (ACH debits and FedNow credits) for ecom platforms. QR payments, just like AliPay, but for the US. We studied past failures at this same idea, and targeted specifically high ticket items (jewelry, luxury), because the fees are a bigger problem, and we could solve other problems with pay-by-bank like limiting botting/scalping and providing digital proof of purchase for resellers.

We raised some money, built it, and demo’d it to dozens of different business. Instant clearing, way cheaper fees, bundle fraud insurance, digital proof of purchase. But it was an uphill battle- people didn’t want it.

Merchants might say they care about the fees, but in practice they care about conversion and getting sales. If you want them to act you need to promise to bring in new revenue, not reduce their cost of existing revenue.

Second problem is the rails. Your only option to debit is ACH, and ACH’s can be returned by the customer for any reason up to 60 days after the debit. Even with return-risk profiling, we had issues with Russian fraudsters using stolen SSNs to onboard as a merchant, do a “custom jewelry” sale for thousands, then as soon as the merchant gets paid out, ACH R10. The “merchant” has RTP’d that money away so when we try to debit it NSFs.

RfPs on FedNow (if they ever get widely adopted) would solve this, because at least they’re irreversible. Until then the only competitor is crypto, but good luck getting US consumers to use a different currency at checkout without tanking your conversion (people have tried!!)

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