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Insights and Expertise

traditional bank products through an app. Customers came from their self-titled article, "One Card to Rule Them
will be able to aggregate banking services from different All," https://bit.ly/3WFPXUu. Visa has access to existing
banks, fintechs or rewards programs. card rails and is positioning itself to provide greater
connectivity.
More than ever, this will be a scale business. Consumer
data will be valuable and conceivably subsidize the cost Visa has the capital and existing relationships, which has
of a transaction, similar to how pay for order flow, (PFOF) shored up its duopoly. I wonder, however, if Visa fully
allows brokerage firms to monetize the routing of trades contemplated its title and understood the One Ring was
to select market makers. crafted by a seriously deranged dude, the Dark Lord
Sauron. And he crafted it on Mount Doom in order to find,
For banks to play, they will need to serve accounts on a bring and "in the darkness bind"—essentially enslaving
platform that integrates with both their own systems the world.
and with competitors, or customers will move to a bank
that allows such access. Interchange will be lessened, so It will be interesting to see if Visa's strengths are able to
issuing banks need to think about how they, too, can offset overcome the heft and inertia that accompanies such a
the loss through additional product sets and features. large entity, and with its awesome powers, potentially,
twist an organization into an unrecognizable form.
Acquirers will need to rely on per-transaction fees rather
than a percentage of the transaction. Fintechs have As founder of Humboldt Merchant Services, co-founder of Eureka
traditionally lived at the margin and will continue to do Payments, and a former executive for such payments innovators as
so, picking off solutions and functionalities that integrate
into a greater payments ecosystem. WePay, a division of JPMorgan Chase, Ken Musante has experience in
all aspects of successful ISO building. He currently provides consulting
And a bit of hyperbole services and expert witness testimony as founder of Napa Payments
and Consulting, www.napapaymentsandconsulting.com. Contact him
As to the orchestration layer, or one app to rule them all, at kenm@napapaymentsandconsulting.com 707-601-7656 or www.
Visa owns the pole position. In fact, the title of this article linkedin.com/in/ken-musante-us.