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Based on a survey of 1,000 PayPal ( PYPL ) customers, an analyst says that the company isn’t getting enough credit for the potential impact of its peer-to-peer payments app, Venmo. According to Jefferies analyst Jason Kupferberg, investor concerns over the Apple ( AAPL ) Pay competitor are exaggerated — PayPal’s mobile sales continue to grow and have, in fact, accelerated since Apple released its payments app, he says in a research note. Venmo is a mobile app that enables friends and family to share expenses such as rent, meals and cab fare. Google, a unit of Alphabet ( GOOGL ), also competes in the payments game with its Android Pay. Though PayPal executives continue to emphasize the firm’s “platform agnostic” approach — it isn’t tied to an operating system or platform — and say that neither Apple nor Google is a real threat, some industry watchers disagree. Alex Rampell, a general partner at noted VC firm Andreesseen Horowitz, likened the prospects of either Apple or Google taking a bigger interest in payments to the Death Star — the planet-destroying battle station in “Star Wars” — approaching for all other rivals. “This isn’t the ‘Empire Strikes Back,’ ” Rampell has told IBD in the past. “This is the Death Star coming.” Kupferberg wrote in a research note Monday that PayPal earnings will accelerate due to transactions conducted with the Venmo app. Venmo is free for now, but PayPal executives say that they plan to monetize the app, which is popular with millennials. They say that PayPal plans to allow selected PayPal merchants to accept payment via the Venmo app — and PayPal would charge its typical transaction fee (2.9%, according to Fortune magazine) in the process. According to Kupferberg, 67% of Venmo users would use the Pay With Venmo feature one or twice a month, with 44% using it three to five times a month, and 19% using it six to 10 times per month. Kupferberg says that Pay With Venmo transactions will yield larger profit margins because Venmo customers typically fund their accounts with debit cards, bank accounts and stored balances — the result of others sending cash. PayPal stock was up more than 2%, near 38, in afternoon trading on the stock market today . The San Jose-based company has an IBD Composite Rating of 91, where 99 is the highest. The stock has had a choppy few months since its spin-off from eBay ( EBAY ) in July. It hit its high of 42.55 during its first trading session on Nasdaq and has plunged to as low as about 30 on several occasions. At least one analyst says that the sell-off has been too hasty . Kupferberg’s price target for PayPal stock is 44. PayPal has recently settled a lawsuit over a perennial issue that the company faces: locked accounts. Scalper1 News
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