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The launch in France of contactless cards by MasterCard Worldwide and major French retailer Carrefour Group comes as demand from consumers for the technology remains unclear. "There is not really a demand from consumers," Adil Moussa, an analyst for United States-based Aite Group, tells CardLine Global. "Contactless is part of a strategy to capture small-ticket items electronically, and it is pushed by issuers and card networks. The reason contactless cards are not a complete success now is because there is no inherent value for the consumer besides the 'cool' factor." Though the cards Carrefour's financial-services arm plans to start issuing next month will enable consumers to make both credit and debit transactions, such cards are "not new in Europe," Moussa notes. Rather, he adds, "the novelty" of contactless could promote use of the technology in Europe, where most smart payment cards carry contact chips supporting the EMV antifraud standard. Another grey area for the Carrefour effort is the availability of payment terminals that can accept contactless cards. MasterCard officials, much like their counterparts at Visa and American Express Co., have remained relatively quiet for years about whether they, or their issuers, subsidize the cost of readers for merchants. Also unclear is how many readers Carrefour plans to install in its stores. "I don't know the number of contactless readers, but I'm sure that in most cases MasterCard will be subsidizing a good portion if not all of the readers for Carrefour and any other large retailer," Moussa says. Neither MasterCard nor Carrefour responded to questions posed by CardLine Global this week about contactless readers. What seems most clear is MasterCard's motivation for working with Carrefour. "As store cards are declining in the U.S. market and fewer stores issue their own credit cards," Moussa says, "MasterCard is looking toward other markets to bring their technology and know-how in the field to achieve growth."
