NFC TIMES Exclusive Insight – Apple released the number of global transactions for its Apple Pay service–believed to be the first time it has done so–as the tech giant touted a tripling of transactions to more than 1 billion for the latest quarter. Apple also disclosed plans by two more large U.S. retailers to accept contactless payments and announced that another major country, Germany, would support Apple Pay, later this year.
While this represents progress for Apple Pay, the top mobile payments service outside of China, the 1 billion-plus transactions for the quarter ending in June still account for a minuscule share of total card transactions. That is nearly four years after Apple launched its landmark digital payments service.
In addition, while the planned rollout of contactless acceptance by two major U.S. merchants, CVS Pharmacy and 7-Eleven, will add nearly 18,000 locations in the U.S., the country continues to lag in adoption of contactless payments, as compared with other developed markets, as NFC Times reported this week. Moreover, Germany, while by far Europe’s largest economy, is not a promising market for the international OEM Pays, including Apple Pay.
