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Brazil's government-run payments system has become dominant

(www.economist.com)
666 points jcartw | 1 comments | 08 Apr 25 10:59 UTC | HN request time: 2.779s | source
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afarah1 ◴[08 Apr 25 11:57 UTC] No.43620640[source]▶
WhatsApp is omnipresent for communication in Brazil, and WhatsApp Pay was ready before Pix, but the government blocked the launch to launch Pix first.[1] I rarely see this mentioned.

[1] https://www.reuters.com/article/technology/brazil-suspends-w...

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paintbox ◴[08 Apr 25 12:15 UTC] No.43620799[source]▶
It's a question of national security not to let Meta eat that cake, and Brasil made the right choice.

Tangentially related, I've heard talk of EU alternative to VISA and Mastercard, which I also believe is the right direction.

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1. DanielHB ◴[08 Apr 25 12:24 UTC] No.43620888[source]▶
These systems are not a direct alternative to Visa/Mastercard. They offer no credit and give no fraud protection and no way to revert transactions (ie you can never get your money back once you send it).

Although they can replace a lot (most?) of existing transactions that are currently done through credit cards, there is still a place for them.