Shopify's payment app spreads; ECB may cap digital currency accounts

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Shopping around

Shopify has expanded Shop Pay to merchants it works with on Facebook and Instagram, the first foray for the payment rail outside of Shopify's platform.

Shop Pay will shortly be available on Instragram in the U.S. with Facebook following after a few weeks, reports TechCrunch. Marketing on Facebook and Instagram through Shopify grew 36% in monthly active users between March and April 2020, mirroring the onset of the pandemic in the U.S. That trend has continued over the past year.

Shop Pay's brand roster includes Allbirds, Beyond Yoga, Jonathan Adler, Kylie Cosmetics, and Blueland, among others. About 40 million buyers use Shop Pay, TechCrunch reports.

Bloomberg

Too central

The European Central Bank may limit digital currency accounts to prevent an imbalance between the central bank digital currency and commercial banks.

Consumer digital euro accounts would be limited to €3,000, or about $3,600, a limit designed to keep people from draining their bank accounts, reports Finextra, adding the impact of a central bank digital currency on commercial banks has become a controversy in Europe.

ECB board member Fabio Panetta has said the digital euro is not designed to compete with banks. He adds the project's aim is to create safe access to money, and the ECB has no interest in broader financial services.

Token journey

Visa is partnering with technology firm Spreedly to improve the reach of tokenization in Latin America, starting in Argentina before moving to other nations.

Tokenization replaces sensitive information with a digital substitute to protect transactions. It's central to the card networks' strategy to support faster payment processing and create a unified checkout experience for e-commerce.

Visa and Spreedly, which provides a digital storage vault for tokens, are also pushing their collaboration as a way to easily update card credentials after expiration. Visa estimates more than half of its payment credentials in Latin America and the Caribbean are token-ready.

On the card

Paytm has added a feature to its rental service that allows tenants to use credit cards to transfer payments directly to landlords' bank accounts. The payment company is additionally offering incentives such as points and cash back.

Renters use Paytm's bill payment link on the landing page, explains Insight Online News. Paytm also supports other payment modes for rent, such as debit, United Payments Interface and digital bank transfers.

Paytm plans to add tuition fees and costs for in-home service to the credit card rail. It's positioning the upgrade as a way for consumers to manage liquidity during the pandemic, and to simplify recurring expenses by embedding rent into the monthly credit card bill.

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