PayPal Sells Off As Apple Pay Comes To The Web

Shares of Paypal Holdings Inc PYPL sold off around 2:00 pm EDT after Apple Inc. AAPL announced, in its ongoing Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC), that its payments service, Apple Pay, previously available in a few iOS apps and brick and mortar retail stores, was finally coming to the World Wide Web.

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Going forward, Mac users will not only have access to Siri, but will also be able to make online payments via Safari by just clicking on an integrated “Pay with Apple Pay” button. But, don’t worry about security: payments will all be authenticated via your smartwatch or phone’s Touch ID. Apple assured that it has already signed agreements with a substantial number of merchants, to offer the option of paying through this platform.

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This is a clear move on PayPal, the current leader in the online payments arena. Analysts have argued that, although PayPal counts on the advantage of “path dependency” – which means customers and merchants are already used to using it, Apple Pay could gain traction on the back of what seems like a faster checkout process.

Disclosure: Javier Hasse holds no positions in any of the securities mentioned above.