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Apple ( AAPL ) and Starbucks ( SBUX ) are expanding the reach of their mobile payment systems, aiming to get a bigger edge on rivals such as PayPal ( PYPL ) and Alphabet ‘s ( GOOGL ) Google. Apple Pay — which supports in-store shopping at retail checkout as well as in-app purchases for Uber, Disney stores and others – will be included in Apple’s Safari browser in time for Q4 holiday shopping, says a Re/code report . The payment system will continue to work with Apple’s fingerprint ID technology as a substitute for inputting 16-digit credit card numbers. Apple aims to solve a problem with mobile shopping; smartphone users tend to browse for products but often don’t pull the trigger to buy. “The checkout page tends to be clunky and requires much in the way of manual entry. Apple Pay boils the checkout down to putting your finger on Touch ID, eliminating multiple steps,” Jordan McKee, an analyst at 451Research, told IBD. “This is troubling news for dominant Web players such as PayPal.” PayPal stock was down 4.5% in early trading in the stock market today while shares of Visa ( V ) and MasterCard ( MA ) were down a fraction. “While this (Apple Pay-Safari) could represent some near-term headline risk for PayPal, we believe the competitive impact introduced by Apple Pay in-browser will be limited due to potential consumer and merchant adoption hurdles,” said Jason Kupferberg, a Jefferies analyst, in a research report. “PayPal’s own expedited checkout process, One Touch, is already in use by more than 250 of the top 500 internet retailers” Apple Pay will also be more competitive with Visa CheckOut. Visa, though, has been active making deals, said Josh Beck, an analyst at Pacific Crest Securities, in a report. “Visa has certainly not been sitting idle as shown by recent minority investments in Chain, Stripe and Square ( SQ ) and product enhancements, including Visa Commerce Network, Visa Token Services and Visa Checkout,” wrote Beck. Starbucks, which has one of the most successful mobile wallets, is expanding its rewards system using a branded prepaid Visa card. Starbucks on Wednesday said the loyalty rewards system will allow customers to earn points for all purchases made with the prepaid card. The Starbucks branded card can be used at any retailer that accepts Visa cards. Image provided by Shutterstock . Scalper1 News
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