Walmart Sides with Stripe, Passes on PayPal: Reports

Wal-Mart Stores Inc., a partner in the Merchant Customer Exchange mobile payments initiative, weighed in on two other payment technologies today: Stripe and PayPal.

Walmart's Goodies.co, a food subscription service, is using Stripe to process payments, Walmart said at the TechCrunch Disrupt event. Stripe provides technology for other companies, including PayPal co-founder Max Levchin's Affirm, to weave payments into the technology they develop.

Separately, Walmart told Reuters it could "not justify acceptance of PayPal" based on the "added complexity" it would add at the point of sale. PayPal works with many large merchants to allow payments at the point of sale, allowing consumers to pay by typing in their phone number and a PIN rather than swiping a card. PayPal and Discover announced today that they are working with 50 merchant acquirers to expand acceptance of PayPal's system to about 2 million merchant locations.

Walmart considers mobile payments "a business model issue" instead of a technology one, Walmart's senior payment director, Jamie Henry, said at a recent conference. Walmart's partners in the MCX mobile wallet initiative include 7-Eleven, CVS, Sears and Target.