The Importance of Square purchasing AfterPay
One of the biggest news in this quarter is Square's purchase of Afterpay.
I view Square's business as the "retail-first" commerce solution for restaurants and retail shops. Bottom line, this will enable their sellers to drive more repeat purchases and higher transaction amounts.
There haven't been many companies focusing on giving this kind of capability to the long-tail of merchants everywhere, and this is exactly what the tie-up allows them to do.
I think the big question for AfterPay's Shopify customers is - what now? Likely AfterPay saw this as a great partner and off-ramp opportunity at the end of an extremely successful run, especially given the storm clouds gathering in this space with Shopify's investment and stake in Affirm.
Many people know about the original Square credit card iPhone dongle and in-store, but many people do not get to see their entire backoffice, Cash app, which recently added tax filing, and other banking solutions.
One interesting question - how did PayPal miss this? Or did they think they "already had this covered"?
