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Brazil's Pix payment system faces pressure from Visa and Mastercard

elciudadano.com

31–40 of 397 posts

Re: Brazil's Pix payment system faces pressure from Visa and Mastercard

#31
post #6
post #3

Every country should have this. Why would you let America take 2-3% of your transaction volumes? It perhaps made sense when the technology was difficult, and America was trusted, but ...

> Why would you let America take 2-3% of your transaction volumes? I don't think VISA/Mastercard takes such a fee? (They'd be some of the biggest companies in the world if they did.) The fees they charge are actually fractions of a percent, the rest are charged by the card issuer, which is usually your bank. You could, in theory, use the VISA network and not pay those fees to a card issuer.

> You could, in theory, use the VISA network and not pay those fees to a card issuer.

You can not. The only way is to have a private agreement with the card issuer. That's why stores all try to push their co-branded cards.

Re: Brazil's Pix payment system faces pressure from Visa and Mastercard

#32
In EU we have multiple national systems, but now they are trying to unify them to the IBAN system, so you can pay in the same way by opening your bank app and scanning a QR code:

https://wero-wallet.eu/

My bank (N26) should support this later this year. I hope it becomes as big and successful as Pix.

Re: Brazil's Pix payment system faces pressure from Visa and Mastercard

#33
post #12
post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I misunderstood, psd2 is Europe's equivalent. And yes, every country should have this. Even America

PSD2 is merely a framework for an uniform access to banking, same APIs everywhere. While you can send money through it, it's still through the same means as normal. Many of the european countries have their own "Pix", but there's no European-wide alternative. The ECB wants to make one (tentatively titled "digital euro"), but it's going to take a long time to come out.

Wero is the alternative, it's moving on quite well. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wero_(payment)

Re: Brazil's Pix payment system faces pressure from Visa and Mastercard

#34
post #27

It's surprising that Visa and Mastercard are even private companies. I expected that the government would be in charge of money and not let a group of people impose a 1-3% tax on their population. In the US, credit cards account for "71% of nationwide retail sales dollars". Governments aren't competent enough to do tech stuff well and they would never make something that works in a different country as well as credit…

[deleted]

Re: Brazil's Pix payment system faces pressure from Visa and Mastercard

#35

People underestimate how difficult it was to transfer money before Pix, even between local banks. The process was hard to use, it could take days and the fees were huge, depending on your bank. Pix solved all these problems. What happens also is that many sellers provide discounts when using Pix, because you dodge the expensive fees charged not only by Visa and MasterCard, but the fees operators (banks, fintechs) cha…

I think we need to put this in context for folks who are not from Brazil. Comparatively, a domestic bank wire in Brazil before Pix was already easier and faster than one in the US today. I don't recall the bank fees being bad either. The issue is that bank wires were never designed for buying lunch at the food court. They're not instant and not user friendly to set up. Pix is alien technology next to the stuff we hav…

It sounds a bit like the Dutch Tikkie with the QR codes and instant transfer. Of course, in the EU most bank wires are already free when using SEPA, and often nearly instant as well. This Tikkie thing is a way to easily create a payment request for people who can't be arsed to simply carry cash (and raise the country's resilience to system failure in the process).

Re: Brazil's Pix payment system faces pressure from Visa and Mastercard

#36
post #27

It's surprising that Visa and Mastercard are even private companies. I expected that the government would be in charge of money and not let a group of people impose a 1-3% tax on their population. In the US, credit cards account for "71% of nationwide retail sales dollars". Governments aren't competent enough to do tech stuff well and they would never make something that works in a different country as well as credit…

Banks are private companies. The Federal Reserve is partially private.

Re: Brazil's Pix payment system faces pressure from Visa and Mastercard

#37

People underestimate how difficult it was to transfer money before Pix, even between local banks. The process was hard to use, it could take days and the fees were huge, depending on your bank. Pix solved all these problems. What happens also is that many sellers provide discounts when using Pix, because you dodge the expensive fees charged not only by Visa and MasterCard, but the fees operators (banks, fintechs) cha…

I think we need to put this in context for folks who are not from Brazil. Comparatively, a domestic bank wire in Brazil before Pix was already easier and faster than one in the US today. I don't recall the bank fees being bad either. The issue is that bank wires were never designed for buying lunch at the food court. They're not instant and not user friendly to set up. Pix is alien technology next to the stuff we hav…

Would you say that Pix is comparable to Canada's Interac Debit?

Re: Brazil's Pix payment system faces pressure from Visa and Mastercard

#39
post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Dollar is already "digital", and has been for the last 50 years or so.

I meant this https://www.federalreserve.gov/central-bank-digital-currency... , this https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_euro and this https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_renminbi

It's just buzzwordy bullshit. The European system is just a classic credit/debit system. The Chinese system is a bit more sophisticated, with offline capability and smart contracts.

But it doesn't use any distributed proof-of-work/stake stuff.

Re: Brazil's Pix payment system faces pressure from Visa and Mastercard

#40

People underestimate how difficult it was to transfer money before Pix, even between local banks. The process was hard to use, it could take days and the fees were huge, depending on your bank. Pix solved all these problems. What happens also is that many sellers provide discounts when using Pix, because you dodge the expensive fees charged not only by Visa and MasterCard, but the fees operators (banks, fintechs) cha…

I worked in a bank in Brazil in the early 2000s. Bank transfers were always easy and relatively quick. At worst, transfers would happen overnight during a national event called bank compensation where all banks would sync up with the Central Bank.

Pix solved a bunch of problems and made all of the above quicker and easier, but Brazil has been at the forefront of banking systems for a long time.

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