I stumbled across J.P. Morgan’s Merchant Services Division’s “Key Trends to Drive Your Payments Strategy” report which outlined 10 trends. Some thoughts on each: are below but one underlying observation is that most is that most of these except maybe 7 (and maybe maybe 2) seem better served by centralized systems rather than decentralized ones. Obviously JPM is selling its own book here but still…

1. Cashierless tech has arrived: I am tempted to be dismissive of how important check-out free retail would be, I am open to the idea that it could unlock new forms of commerce that might be hard to imagine, like walking down an airport terminal and snagging a water for your flight without having to stop.
2. Faster payments for consumers and businesses: A reminder to myself to revisit FT Alphaville’s RTGS series of posts. My suspicion is settlement times are features, not bugs.
3. From subscriptions to recurring relationships: I get why recurring revenues are so valuable. But I wonder if non-recurring transaction could end up being a premium product for certain product categories. The luxury of not having subscriptions for consumers. the luxury of buying or building rather than renting for firms.
4. Payments simplified: I have better come to appreciate the last few months how numerous and important API solutions are. I can also see how this leads to operational debt. Is this the toehold for acquiring banks to shift the competitive balance in the payments space?: “The provider offers one integrated package of payments, treasury services and commercial cards, and the client gets one set of APIs, one set of analytics, and one integration into the underlying technology. J.P. Morgan can manage the full range of complexity in payments and provide an integrated view into companies’ entire financial picture, from pay-in to pay-out.”
5. Relentless fraudsters: Will card-notpresent (CNP) related fraud become a standard accounting line item? See Fintech’s security/access paradox problem. Another True Tradeoff Tension. Maybe this is another space for acquiring banks to run hard at?
6. Key insights, big impacts: Data science!
7. Payments in context: “Drivers love the idea of interacting with brands directly through the vehicle’s infotainment system, either with voice or through touch.” — help…
8. Integrated payments: “PayFac as a Service”
9. Customer-centric, seamless payments: “In any transaction, the payment is the moment of truth. It’s when a customer transforms intent into action.” — We are meeting people where they are, et cetera.
10. What happens after Covid: Contactless; ecommerce; credit rebound versus debit; BOPIS inventory management.