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I don't think they believe that so much they believe they can skim off the top of certain areas of commerce on iOS. If they did it with bank transactions, Apple

by duped 5y ago

I don't think they believe that so much they believe they can skim off the top of certain areas of commerce on iOS. If they did it with bank transactions, Apple Pay, Venmo, Robinhood, etc then people would be up in arms.

dannyw 5y ago
Divide and conquer. It's gaming and software apps now. It'll be bank transactions and commerce later on. A 1% "Apple Platform Safety Fee" on Robinhood wouldn't surprise me....
- ben_w 5y ago
  Sounds like you’re complaining about a hypothetical future where they charge less than Visa and MasterCard? https://www.fool.com/the-ascent/research/average-credit-card-processing-fees-costs-america/ https://www.fool.com/the-ascent/research/average-credit-card...
  - blendergeek 5y ago
    No, in this world they will charge on top of Visa and Mastercard.
  - ImprovedSilence 5y ago
    What about funding your robinhood account from your bank and not a card, so neither you nor robinhood pay transaction fees?
    - zrail 5y ago
      Bank rails still cost money on a per transaction basis.
      - theptip 5y ago
        ACH costs a few cents per transaction. I’ve never seen a company pass this on to their customers.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
maxsilver 5y ago
> If they did it with bank transactions, Apple Pay, Venmo, Robinhood, etc then people would be up in arms. Would they? Don't they literally already do this too? Isn't Apple Card https://www.apple.com/apple-card/ https://www.apple.com/apple-card/ them literally skimming off the top of every financial transaction, despite them doing nothing but provide a branded whitelabeled Goldman Sachs Mastercard? (admittedly, a very pretty fancy card) I don't think the general population will ever be terribly up in arms with Apple's behaviour anymore, so long as Apple keeps forcing other businesses to hide Apple's taxes/fees/cuts for them.
- duped 5y ago
  A credit card with standard transaction fees and interest is very different than taking 30% of every transaction on the platform while also having the power to forbid venders on the platform from increasing their prices to make up the difference.
  - maxsilver 5y ago
    Absolutely agree, but it's not that much different than expecting a tax on every Venmo/PayPal/Robinhood transaction on the store (if I'm reading this correctly, this is a thing Cook just implied they might do in sworn testimony today)
    - duped 5y ago
      At the end of the day it's all about power, price and value. A small transaction fee to handle payment processing is reasonable, since everyone creates value for everyone somewhere. A tax for existence on a platform is just rent seeking and increases prices for everyone but Apple. That's not desirable and likely illegal. The worst case scenario is Spotify-cation of services where Apple used the App Store to identify popular services, counters with their own, and then charges extortionate fees such that they cannot compete with Apple's native services. I would be concerned if we start seeing an Apple Brokerage. Apple Pay doesn't have a direct competitor in Venmo since Venmo is about payment processing between people who don't normally deal with credit card processing, and cross platform functionality is the biggest value prop. Apple Pay isnt a threat unless it works on all platforms equally.

by duped 5y ago

dannyw 5y ago

Divide and conquer. It's gaming and software apps now. It'll be bank transactions and commerce later on. A 1% "Apple Platform Safety Fee" on Robinhood wouldn't surprise me....

ben_w 5y ago
Sounds like you’re complaining about a hypothetical future where they charge less than Visa and MasterCard? https://www.fool.com/the-ascent/research/average-credit-card-processing-fees-costs-america/ https://www.fool.com/the-ascent/research/average-credit-card...
- blendergeek 5y ago
  No, in this world they will charge on top of Visa and Mastercard.
- ImprovedSilence 5y ago
  What about funding your robinhood account from your bank and not a card, so neither you nor robinhood pay transaction fees?
  - zrail 5y ago
    Bank rails still cost money on a per transaction basis.
    - theptip 5y ago
      ACH costs a few cents per transaction. I’ve never seen a company pass this on to their customers.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]

maxsilver 5y ago

> If they did it with bank transactions, Apple Pay, Venmo, Robinhood, etc then people would be up in arms. Would they? Don't they literally already do this too? Isn't Apple Card https://www.apple.com/apple-card/ https://www.apple.com/apple-card/ them literally skimming off the top of every financial transaction, despite them doing nothing but provide a branded whitelabeled Goldman Sachs Mastercard? (admittedly, a very pretty fancy card) I don't think the general population will ever be terribly up in arms with Apple's behaviour anymore, so long as Apple keeps forcing other businesses to hide Apple's taxes/fees/cuts for them.

duped 5y ago
A credit card with standard transaction fees and interest is very different than taking 30% of every transaction on the platform while also having the power to forbid venders on the platform from increasing their prices to make up the difference.
- maxsilver 5y ago
  Absolutely agree, but it's not that much different than expecting a tax on every Venmo/PayPal/Robinhood transaction on the store (if I'm reading this correctly, this is a thing Cook just implied they might do in sworn testimony today)
  - duped 5y ago
    At the end of the day it's all about power, price and value. A small transaction fee to handle payment processing is reasonable, since everyone creates value for everyone somewhere. A tax for existence on a platform is just rent seeking and increases prices for everyone but Apple. That's not desirable and likely illegal. The worst case scenario is Spotify-cation of services where Apple used the App Store to identify popular services, counters with their own, and then charges extortionate fees such that they cannot compete with Apple's native services. I would be concerned if we start seeing an Apple Brokerage. Apple Pay doesn't have a direct competitor in Venmo since Venmo is about payment processing between people who don't normally deal with credit card processing, and cross platform functionality is the biggest value prop. Apple Pay isnt a threat unless it works on all platforms equally.