Leakage of Facebook’s (NASDAQ:FB) payment plans for messenger and WhatsApp

According to recent news, Facebook (NASDAQ:FB) is expected to enter into the payments business on desktop and mobile. These rumors were accelerated when the company hired the former Pay-Pal chief David Marcus to handle the Facebook messenger. This new venture will be a great source for generating revenues for the company.

Earlier this month, Andrew Aude, a Stanford computer science major discovered a discreet digital payment feature inside the iOS source code of the messenger app. This discovery is a testimony to Facebook’s (NASDAQ:FB) plan to use messenger as a means of regulating payments through texts.

Considering the Facebook (NASDAQ:FB) user base, WhatsApp’s global popularity, it can be said that by combining the two, a platform of 800 million users can be reached for Facebook’s (NASDAQ:FB) mobile payments. At the year’s beginning a Facebook (NASDAQ:FB) buy button was revealed which gave the company a desktop based platform for payments. Facebook (NASDAQ:FB) can generate revenues, either by using a per-transaction model or by increasing the value of advertisements.

Per-transaction method

When Aude came across the payment feature, he also explored its features and mentioned in a Tech Crunch article that he didn’t see any options for fee or payments. Facebook (NASDAQ:FB) is known for introducing features on the site and then making changes later on. The messenger app which is now needed for chats on mobiles didn’t initially have any advertisements.

If Facebook (NASDAQ:FB) is to gather charges as a transaction processor through payment processors like Visa (NYSE: V) and MasterCard (NYSE: MA), then it won’t be free of charge. The only way to stay cost free is in securing a deal with Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) and start earning money from the payment processors.

Although Facebook (NASDAQ:FB) has not declared how it will fashion its payment business, but some sort of a fee is expected. The social network has millions of users and even if an average user contributes $1 on the messenger and Whatsapp, the company could end up getting millions of dollars in annual revenues.

Increasing the value of advertisements

Another way to generate revenues is by increasing the value of advertisements. Facebook, in its latest quarter earned $2.67 billion from advertisements. Advertisers buy placements in feeds by approaching Facebook (NASDAQ:FB) users based on their interests. Once the user clicks on the ad to access retailer’s website and buys a product by entering payment information, only then the company gets paid. Once the payment feature becomes available on the mobiles through texts and desktop with the buy button, the users can make a quick purchase without the hassle of going on the website and typing in the payment information. This method of purchase will automatically boost the revenues for the company and has a lot of potential for future.

This feature may attract users who want to sell items, they can upload a product that they want to sell on Facebook (NASDAQ:FB), rather than putting it up on other sites and can sell it directly to other Facebook (NASDAQ:FB) users.