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Brazil central bank to launch Pix installment feature in September

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Re: Brazil central bank to launch Pix installment feature in September

#41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Credit cards give me cashback, worldwide acceptance and peace of mind. The country I live in, Switzerland, has a very widely accepted QR-based payment system... but credit cards (in mobile wallets) are more convenient, safer, faster. The only time I use the QR codes is when a merchant doesn't have a card terminal.

The cashback you are given back is taken from a fraction of the fee levied on merchants by the Payment Processing company they use. The only thing holding this system together is the lobby (also funded by a part of the aforementioned fee on merchants) by the Payment Processing industry to uphold laws that prohibit more expensive payments for more expensive payment methods, and also the extensive marketing (funded by…

Credit card isn't more expensive than its main competitor, cash, though. It's just the costs of credit card acceptance are transparently added to each transaction, while the costs of cash are distributed over the whole day's cash transactions and so more opaque.

Merchants have a psychological (and in some countries, legal) barrier to charging more for cash than other payment methods, even though it's the least efficient. Given this, cash-back is the best way to share the efficiency gains with the end user. Maybe if Pix or Twint or debit cards or what-have-you are so efficient, they should also give consumers cashback.

Re: Brazil central bank to launch Pix installment feature in September

#42
post #3

This is hands down one of the best instant payment platforms at the moment. Only India's UPI can match it in features, and China and Thailand in adoption. Most Western countries have had a (somewhat timid) taste of instant payments, but most don't know what it means to just drop credit and debit cards and cash altogether for a system that is not just universally adopted (from apps to flea markets to online payments a…

> This is hands down one of the best instant payment platforms at the moment. Only India's UPI can match it in features, and China and Thailand in adoption.

I'm not familiar with Pix or UPI, so out of curiosity, how are they better than Alipay/WeChat Pay (which I am familiar with)?

Re: Brazil central bank to launch Pix installment feature in September

#43
post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

SEPA is not crap. It's actually pretty awesome, considering that you can instantly transfer money between 5000+ banks in 30+ countries, with practically zero fees. The UX of SEPA is lacking in comparison to other modern payment systems for sure. I'm confident though, that it will improve soon. Wero [1] seems like a decent start and appears to be gaining traction lately. It's basically a layer on top of SEPA Instant p…

> with practically zero fees We pay 2.50 EUR for a SEPA transfer, it's ridiculously expensive. We need local integrations for every market to cut costs.

That is pretty expensive, I agree. I pay zero additional fees when using my private account. For my business account I'm charged ~30 Cents flat per transaction. I know that there are banks offering better terms, but I'm too lazy to switch for just a couple of Euros in savings.

Re: Brazil central bank to launch Pix installment feature in September

#44
post #26
post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Apple is irrelevant in 3rd world countries. It is a luxury brand for millionaires. Doesn't have mass appeal. Apple has 9% market share in Brazil. This is not irrelevant. It’s not a luxury thing for millionaires, but rather a status symbol for the middle class. There’s this whole market of iPhone leasing plans where you get a new phone whenever Apple releases a new one, banks offering 21x installment payment plans t…

How much of these 9% uses Apple Pay? My bet it's just a small part. People still use Pix and physical Credit/Debit Cards. Google Pay/Apple Pay are far behind.

Considering all the major banks credit cards are able to be added to Apple Pay's wallet, my educated guess is if a person has an iPhone and a credit card, they are using it through Apple Pay most of the time. Even meal voucher cards are now able to be added to Apple Pay's wallet.

I don't have statistics readily available, but you can search for CADE's (Brazilian fair trade regulator) inquiry 08700.002893/2025-17 on Apple's refusal to support Pix on Apple Pay and comb through the documents.

Re: Brazil central bank to launch Pix installment feature in September

#45
post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

SEPA is not crap. It's actually pretty awesome, considering that you can instantly transfer money between 5000+ banks in 30+ countries, with practically zero fees. The UX of SEPA is lacking in comparison to other modern payment systems for sure. I'm confident though, that it will improve soon. Wero [1] seems like a decent start and appears to be gaining traction lately. It's basically a layer on top of SEPA Instant p…

> with practically zero fees We pay 2.50 EUR for a SEPA transfer, it's ridiculously expensive. We need local integrations for every market to cut costs.

Where in Europe are you getting charged that much?

Usually SEPA payments are completely free for consumers. And I believe there’s a EU-mandated fee cap which is much less than 2.50 €. But if you have a business account, things are different.

Re: Brazil central bank to launch Pix installment feature in September

#46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The cashback you are given back is taken from a fraction of the fee levied on merchants by the Payment Processing company they use. The only thing holding this system together is the lobby (also funded by a part of the aforementioned fee on merchants) by the Payment Processing industry to uphold laws that prohibit more expensive payments for more expensive payment methods, and also the extensive marketing (funded by…

Credit card isn't more expensive than its main competitor, cash, though. It's just the costs of credit card acceptance are transparently added to each transaction, while the costs of cash are distributed over the whole day's cash transactions and so more opaque. Merchants have a psychological (and in some countries, legal) barrier to charging more for cash than other payment methods, even though it's the least effici…

It could give cashback if it cost 3% of the transaction. But it’s it’s actually much cheaper. For credit cards you have to pay for the brand, the issuer and the acquirer. And each gets a nice cut.

Re: Brazil central bank to launch Pix installment feature in September

#47
post #3

This is hands down one of the best instant payment platforms at the moment. Only India's UPI can match it in features, and China and Thailand in adoption. Most Western countries have had a (somewhat timid) taste of instant payments, but most don't know what it means to just drop credit and debit cards and cash altogether for a system that is not just universally adopted (from apps to flea markets to online payments a…

Systems like these are very common in Europe. Here in Norway, you can pay for almost anything, anywhere with Vipps. It works very similarly to Brazilian Pix. Another system I have used in the past is the Portuguese MBWay which although similar to Pix and Vipps, doesn’t seem to be as widely adopted as the former.

The problem is that most European schemes are country specific. As soon as you cross the border even to another European country, your options are pretty much cash or Visa/MasterCard.

Re: Brazil central bank to launch Pix installment feature in September

#48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Credit cards give me cashback, worldwide acceptance and peace of mind. The country I live in, Switzerland, has a very widely accepted QR-based payment system... but credit cards (in mobile wallets) are more convenient, safer, faster. The only time I use the QR codes is when a merchant doesn't have a card terminal.

> Credit cards give me cashback, worldwide acceptance and peace of mind. That's because you (and everyone else in Switzerland, even those paying cash) is eating a 2-3% merchant fee markup. In the civilised world like the EU, where credit card interchange fees are capped of 0.3%, those cashback benefits (which is, again, your money you've just paid) don't exist. > worldwide acceptance For now, at a huge economy-wide c…

Switzerland has interchange fees of 0.4% for consumer credit cards (by contactless, only slightly higher by chip+pin): https://www.visaeurope.ch/content/dam/VCOM/regional/ve/unite..., https://www.mastercard.com/content/dam/public/mastercardcom/.... And yet banks offer 0.33% cashback cards: https://certo-card.ch/one.

And let's not forget that cash acceptance costs an order of magnitude more than this anyway; if anything businesses should charge surcharges for accepting cash, not the other way around, and given the social constraint of no surcharges, cashback is a fair mechanism to reward efficient payment methods.

Re: Brazil central bank to launch Pix installment feature in September

#49

I believe the greatest story behind Brazil's Pix, India's UPI and Kenya's Mpesa is the emergence of a lot new forms of money. We will have strong national currencies supported by these payment systems, destroying Visa and Mastercard and hurting PayPal, Apple Pay and Google Pay. These systems have a lot more potential than most people imagine (e.g.: micro lending , even for illiterate people). We will have "gangster m…

I find it interesting your very narrow view of cryptocurrencies given the things you're excited about.

Don't let the bad shit (and, holy shit, there is a lot) distract from the potential.

Re: Brazil central bank to launch Pix installment feature in September

#50
post #3

This is hands down one of the best instant payment platforms at the moment. Only India's UPI can match it in features, and China and Thailand in adoption. Most Western countries have had a (somewhat timid) taste of instant payments, but most don't know what it means to just drop credit and debit cards and cash altogether for a system that is not just universally adopted (from apps to flea markets to online payments a…

> … CCs should be an exception, not the norm they are now, with a bunch of embedded costs we all pay for, one way or another.

To spell it out, the merchant pays fees to the payment processor and carries risk (chargebacks, etc) and these costs are included (“embedded”) in the purchase price of whatever you’re buying.

Moving to instant pay moves these risks to the purchaser, which is probably not ideal for the merchant because it forces purchasers to be more careful with their spending. New merchants in particular would have to work harder to establish their reputation. Larger merchants would probably start offering credit again.

Where “insta pay” shines is for merchants with less credit worthy customers, because it allows them to operate online and in an electronic world. Currently in the U.S. that job is done with cash, but perhaps very soon with privately issued stablecoins. I guess the big question is whether the U.S. government should issue a stablecoin or similar electronic cash-like thing.

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