Mobile Money

When your smart phone is your wallet.  Swipe the phone.  Pay the bill.  We’ll look at life and cash in the age of mobile payment.

“Cash in hand” is a phrase with a certain ring to it. It may soon sound antique. The world of banking and retail, of Google and smart phones, is gearing up to say goodbye to cash. Mobile payment is the big new buzz. No coins. No bills. No credit card.

Just step up in the store and wave your smartphone. Transaction complete. The money gone, from your account to theirs.  It’s already fully on in Europe and Asia.  It’s about to go big in the USA.  With all kinds of implications.

This hour, On Point:  the smart phone as your new wallet.  Mobile payment, and the end of cash.
-Tom Ashbrook

Michael Copeland, senior editor at WIRED, where he focuses on all things related to the business of technology.

Ed McLaughlin, chief emerging payments officer at MasterCard.

Hilary Cherniss, owner of Devil's Teeth Baking Company.

Wired "Square releases the total dollar amount of sales that go through the system, not the total number of transactions. The most recent number puts total Square-enabled sales at more than $5 billion per year. That gets you to about $14 million per day. Since this snapshot captures a high activity part of the day across the entire U.S (not much being sold between midnight and 5 A.M.) this one hour likely represents several million dollars in sales. Square’s take in a hour? About $60,000."

Fortune "Café Grumpy is the kind of hipster hangout that wouldn't deign to trumpet itself. Tucked away on a quiet street in New York's Chelsea neighborhood, it's easy to miss. There's no sign out front, just a frowning face stenciled on a large shop window. And yet when I walked in for the first time, I immediately felt like one of the regulars. "Charge it to Miguel," I told the barista after ordering a cappuccino, and charge it he did — to my phone."

US Banker "The use of mobile payments among U.S. consumers has grown dramatically in the past year, an IDC Financial Insights study released yesterday has found. A third of consumers — 33.9% — make purchases with their mobile phone, according to the survey of 2,663 U.S. adults."

In this commercial, you can see the two types of Square transactions.