Wal-Mart Stores Inc. detailed its plan to continue to expand in the money-services business.
The Bentonville, Ark., company said Wednesday that by the end of next month it will double the number of its stores selling Wal-Mart MoneyCard prepaid cards, to 2,600.
By the end of next year it will more than quadruple the number of in-store Wal-Mart MoneyCenters, to 1,000.
GE Money, a Stamford, Conn., unit of General Electric Co., issues the prepaid card.
Wal-Mart has been testing the card since November at 1,300 stores in 13 states, the Stamford, Conn., unit said. Customers can load their paychecks on to the card through Green Dot Corp.'s processing network.
By yearend Wal-Mart plans to double the number of MoneyCenters, which offer check-cashing services, money orders, bill payments, and money transfers, to 450.
It providers money transfers through a partnership with MoneyGram International Inc.
Tien-Tsin Huang, an analyst with JPMorgan Securities Inc., wrote in a research note issued this month that the MoneyCenter expansion could hurt MoneyGram and other money transfer providers.
For example, Wal-Mart could launch its own remittance service in Latin America, where it has more than 1,600 stores, by taking advantage of the Visa network, he wrote.
Consumers who want a MoneyCard pay $8.94 at the point of sale and provide certain identity information before receiving the card in the mail. Cardholders pay a fee to reload the card at more than 30,000 merchant locations where the Green Dot network is available, but the fee is waived for loading a payroll or government check at Wal-Mart. The monthly fee of $4.94 is waived for cardholders who load at least $1,000 on the card in a calendar month, GE said. Cardholders can also get cash back at no cost with purchases.
Wal-Mart, which entered the money-services business this decade, said it conducts more than 2 million such transactions every week.
The world's largest retailer said that it charges up to 50% less for check-cashing services, money transfers, and money orders than traditional providers, and that its customers who use those services save an average of $40 a month.
