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

Post by protastus » Thu, May 07, 2026, 8:04 PM UTC

jszymborski wrote: post #37

protastus wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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?

Post by rbanffy » Thu, May 07, 2026, 8:08 PM UTC

shpx wrote: 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…

Post by augusto-moura » Thu, May 07, 2026, 8:15 PM UTC

cassianoleal wrote: post #40

dbolgheroni wrote: post #15

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.

Post by contingencies » Thu, May 07, 2026, 8:24 PM UTC

rbanffy wrote: post #43

shpx wrote: 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…

> a group of people impose a 1-3% tax on their population. It seems the consensus is that a taxes are only bad if you have to pay the government. If it's a small set of companies that collectively own a virtual monopoly, it's because they earned it.

Post by dyauspitr » Thu, May 07, 2026, 8:26 PM UTC

jacknews wrote: 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 ...