Who Will Win the Mobile Payment War – Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) or Merchant Customer Exchange?

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By Hanson So on November 3, 2014 Company, Technology & Software

News broke out in the market when pharmacies CVS and Rite Aid refused to accept payments made through the Apple Inc’s (NASDAQ:AAPL) pay program. The reason for this remains unstated. However, there is a rumor going on in the market that Apple’s pay program clashes with another competing system, Current C.

According to the news, Current C is online payment software that is being developed by a retailer company, Merchant Customer Exchange. The company plans to launch its software somewhere in the first half of the year 2015.

As for Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL), the company has made deals with all the big credit card companies including MasterCard (NYSE:MA) and Visa Inc. (NYSE:V). Not only this, but the company has also entered into an agreement with all the major banks of United States in order for consumers to get their credit cards linked with Apply Pay. Apply Pay will be using Apple NFC in order to make payments.

If the customers integrate their credit cards with Apple Pay, the credit cards companies will still be able to get their swipe fees whereas Apply will also secure a cut. From a merchant or consumers’ point of view, this is just an extra cost that they will have to pay in order to use Apple Pay.

Merchant Customer Exchange claims that its software, CurrentC, will throw credit card companies out of the picture. Since it is an established fact that nobody wants to pay the fees that they can avoid, CurrentC will make sure that the customers have to pay as less fees as possible. The system will allow the users to interlink their bank accounts directly to the app; this way, the credit card companies will be sidelined.

One example of such an app is Starbucks Corporation (NASDAQ:SBUX). Hundreds of thousands of customers use the app to pay for their food, coffer, and tea, every week at the Starbucks; and the company does not have to give the credit card companies their 2 or 3 percent swiping fees.

There are a number of questions going on in the minds of market researchers. One of the major questions that the researchers are trying to answer is as to whether customers will choose brand names of Apply Pay or Google wallet where they will have to pay some of their money to credit card companies in lieu of swiping fees or whether they will prefer emerging technologies that allow them to save some money every time they make a transaction. Perhaps, only time will answer these questions.

Coming to the stock prices of Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL), the company, on the last trading day, November 3, 2014, started its stocks at a price of $108.01 and closed at a price of $108.00, after hitting the highest figures of $108.04. The intraday range for the company’s stocks was recorded to be from $107.21 to $108.04. The company has a total market capitalization of $633.4 billion with a P/E (price to earnings) ratio of 16.8.