American consumers may not go to bank branches all that often, but they sure go to Walmart. 80% of Americans are said to shop at Walmart at least once a year. America’s largest retailer debuted a service called Walmart-2-Walmart last week that allows customers to send money to other customers using the store’s network of more than 4,0o0 retail locations. These person-to-person payments are ordinarily a feature of digital banking services, and see their fullest use case in Africa, where M-Pesa and similar services allow for near-frictionless movement of money through mobile phone carriers. M-Pesa users can use the cash digitally fro their phones or pick up cash at agencies that partner with the service. After the announcement, some observers wondered if the US-only aspect of the service would limit its utility, but Walmart seems to be looking to the large population of customers with limited bank relationships to drive usage rather than to the international remittances market. (Walmart does have a large non-US footprint that it could potentially extend the service to later.) Transfers up to $50 cost $4.50, and transfers up the limit, $900, cost $9.50. Transfers can be funded by debit cards or cash. While talk of money transfers […]
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