Apple: The Underdog Story??

In March of 2023, Apple quietly rolled out a new feature. A feature that would change the world as we know it.

I know what you must be thinking: “he must be talking about the VR headset or some gizmo.”

As a matter of fact, I am talking about Apple’s Buy Now Pay Later program in the US. The dominant players in the Buy Now, Pay Later space are Afterpay, Klarna and Affirm.

Apple has one thing going for them; they have 50 Million Apple Pay users and 6.5 million Apple Card holders.

“Wait WAITTTT- what is Buy now Pay Later?? I don’t understand”

Let’s bring in the ‘Thinker’

Thinker here to explain:

“Buy Now Pay Later (BNPL) is basically a type of installment loan. It allows you to make a purchase and pay for that purchase in series of ‘installments’ over time.

For example: Mary brought a brand new TV for $500:

She pays $125 at checkout essentially 25% of the cost, while the remaining 75% is spread out over time usually two weeks apart, meaning as long as Mary makes all her payments on time, Mary can pay off her purchase in six weeks.

These BNPL programs generally come with interest and fees depending on the provider and some charge neither.”

Apple Pay Later, allows users to split purchases into four payments spread over six weeks with no interest or fees, which I believe is a Win-Win-Win: they provide consumers the accessibility to purchase items, Apple provides the seller enable sales they may have not gotten and Apple could grow and retain its customer base further driving higher usage rates giving Apple more data on its users to market to.

and don’t cry for Goldman Sachs → It’s one of the biggest beneficiaries of the Apple financial segment push.

Have you tried Apple BNPL Program? What are your thoughts on it? Let me know in the comments below:

Originally published at https://aatish.substack.com.