Apple and Goldman Sachs are working together on a new, joint credit card affiliated with the former’s biometrically secured mobile payments platform, according to new reports.
The collaboration will replace Apple’s longstanding rewards card partnership with Barclays, and will represent Apple’s first big foray into physical credit cards, with the company having become increasingly involved in the payments business in recent years via its Apple Pay mobile payments platform.
Indeed, the Goldman Sachs partnership appears to be aimed at boosting the use of Apple Pay, which will presumably be cross-promoted with the physical credit card. As The Wall Street Journal reports, Apple currently takes a 0.15 percent cut of every Apple Pay transaction, but with its new Goldman Sachs credit card, it would take more than 0.3 percent. Apple could also collect a ‘bounty’ from Goldman Sachs of over $100 for each new cardholder, and Goldman Sachs may offer special lending services to clients looking to buy Apple products, though both companies are still hashing out the details of their arrangement.
News of the partnership arrives in the wake of a quarterly update in which Apple CEO Tim Cook asserted that Apple Pay had doubled account activations and tripled transactions year-over-year. Apple is thought to be leaning toward revenues from its services, such as Apple Pay, as a means of adjusting to declines in sales for its pricey new iPhones and other devices.
The new Apple-Goldman Sachs credit card is anticipated to make it debut early next year.
Sources: The Wall Street Journal, CNBC
(Originally posted on FindBiometrics)
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