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Comment by MaxwellM | Hacker News Reader

Also maybe, try to innovate instead of suffocating innovation with a pillow stuffed with cash.

US debit business is likely replaced with Fed instant payments in 2-3 years [1] (the core functionality is approved and building has started [2]). Can't innovate your way out of a central bank replacing your product. You're only left with uncompetitive business options to hold onto your regulatory capture as long as possible.

Plaid exists because the US hasn't mandated financial API access like Europe did with PSD2. Regulatory requirements to support this would negate the need for "innovative" startups.

EDIT: Real Talk, these networks should not be taxing economies percentage points of total payment volume [3] (again, Europe used regulation to cram down interchange fees to be more reasonable). These are legacy businesses that should be replaced with low cost utility-esq payment services such that the Fed is doing (and already exist in most first world countries [4]).

[1] https://www.bankingdive.com/news/fed-gives-new-details-on-it...

[2] https://www.federalreserve.gov/newsevents/speech/brainard202...

[3] https://theweek.com/articles/850232/why-are-all-paying-tax-c...

[4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Instant_payment#Examples_of_in...

> Can't innovate your way out of a central bank replacing your product.

What about the fact that Visa and Mastercard are accepted internationally pretty much universally for transactions, whereas what you're talking about would be more likely analogous to the UK Faster Payments Service (though state backed). It's fantastic, however for buying a coffee tapping a contactless card that's also accepted in most other countries is much nicer. Perhaps with mobile wallets and being able to scan a QR to pay for stuff or using NFC could be equivalent in ease-of-use.

I don't hand wave away this use case, but it is a much smaller amount of volume compared to domestic payments. As instant payment services sponsored by central banks roll out, the hurdles become lower for cross currency/international transactions. TransferWise already does a swank job interfacing with antiquated financial infra for cross border transfers and payments, I imagine that you'll see more competitors and possibly even native integration with central bank apps for cross border payments as improvements continue. It's all messages (ISO 20022) on a bus or in queues after all.

My country is heavily pushing for this kind of payment system. Given how bad android security and patching is I wouldn't trust anything involving my phone.

So will this mean we go from having a fairly standard international payment system with two main players (Visa/Mastercard) where anyone from any country can pay for things in pretty much any other country, the same, way, to a situation where every country has it's own (perhaps cheaper) system. How does that work for tourism?

I assume the traditional cross border payments will stick around until better systems using new instant payment primitives are built. I would not anticipate these user experiences to get worse, only better.

Interac in Canada is doing pretty well...it's not an either/or situation. National low-cost payment networks are pretty easy, and have been helped back artificially in the US.

https://newsroom.interac.ca/interac-by-the-numbers/

*held back

You don't have to have a global network to have global acceptance - RuPay[1] is a domestic-only network in India, but RuPay cards are accepted internationally via the Discover network. And the Fed seems to be heavily emphasizing interoperability with existing/external financial systems for FedNow, so there's no reason to think that wouldn't extend to interoperability/integration with international partners to extend acceptance internationally.

And even if they don't, siphoning off a huge chunk of domestic-only US transactions will still be a massive blow to Visa and Mastercard's revenue stream. And the ubiquitous nature of FedNow domestically could easily disrupt market dynamics, if/when it reaches a point of saturation where businesses can actively choose to not accept Visa/Mastercard payments. Squeezing their 40-50+% profit margins on top of reducing their revenue, as they're forced to actually be competitive against FedNow.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RuPay

Casual international use isn't much of a concern for most people in the US.

> these networks should not be taxing economies percentage points of total payment volume

I agree, but what value do you place on the insurance aspect of credit-card payments? There are definitely vendors I only buy from because I know I can call Citibank if they screw me.

"Let merchants charge customers the credit transaction fee as a surcharge [1] [2], and let consumers pay to receive the benefits if they so desire. Everyone else can use debit cards now, and instant payments when they arrive in 2023-2024 [3] [4]. If it's transaction insurance customers demand, let them vote with their dollars (versus mandating everyone pay it as a transaction tax)."

Therefore, if you value the insurance, you still should have access to it, but you should pay for it.

Citations above are in my original comment on the topic: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24899057

To add to this, there is a big problem with the current structure of "insurance" as a flat rate for all consumers.

The risk is shared between the business and consumer, as all legitimate businesses still have disputes and I know many consumers who "just disputed a charge" to not pay.

My guess (based on watching data on 2 businesses for 10 years) is that 90% of the risk in the transaction is probably in the consumer (but hard to know for sure).

This makes sense, because right now with a flat rate the "good customers" (who rarely disupte) subsidize the "bad customers" (who dispute a lot).

It would be a bad idea for everyone got the same rate for car insurance, because it would promote bad behavior (since being a bad driver would be subsidized).

Small businesses also get disproportionally hit with this issue. People are less likely to dispute a charge with Amazon (and lose access to its service) than the local store.

So the bulk of the "cost" of insurance here is borne by small businesses and good customers.

How are you going to get people to adopt something that makes them pay a surcharge? Mastercard/Visa are free for the consumer (other than shops that charge for card payment, but they made that illegal in the UK).

See my citations [1] and [2] in the link in my comment you replied to where credit card surcharges charged by merchants are already permitted in the US. If instant payments are free to the customer, but they pay for the credit card transaction, the behavioral economic nudge is obvious.

On a first approximation, I place a negative value. The largest effect of that insurance is enabling the ridiculous security of credit card transactions.

Ignoring that, not much, because credit card companies are hard to deal with and that insurance doesn't even always materialize.

I'm sure there will be lucrative contracts to be had by banks in that scheme. Just like electronic tax filing and ACA health plans.

I'm not so jaded yet to believe that it won't be an improvement over the status quo. YMMV. Get involved (I am, and submit comments to the Fed and contact reps on the U.S. House Committee on Financial Services). Be the squeaky wheel, do some bureaucracy hacking. Communications and relationships with representatives is some of the greatest leverage you'll ever have. Success is not assured, but constant vigilance is mandatory.

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