Square adds more robust software services (SQ)

BII

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Square, which has recently been laser-focused on its software and services growth, announced an expansion of its Instant Deposit program in order to add further flexibility for its merchant clients.

Now, for a 1% fee, merchants can schedule their daily sales to deposit in their bank account in real-time at their convenience, regardless of day or time. 

This is an expansion of Square’s highly successful Instant Deposit program, which allows merchants to deposit their sales immediately into their accounts, also for a small fee. Since launching last August, the platform has counted over 2 million instant deposits, with the total number of enrolled merchants more than doubling since the beginning of 2016. That success was likely an impetus to add more robust deposit-based features in order to increase merchant convenience.

Investing in robust software and service offerings ultimately helps Square increase its bottom line. 

• As the mobile point-of-sale (mPOS) landscape becomes increasingly competitive, firms are moving into developing software and additional service offerings for their clients. Square’s software and data segment nearly tripled year-over-year (YoY) in Q1 2016, compared to 51% overall revenue growth.
• That’s because these services help Square sellers grow, which in turn helps Square’s performance. In addition to capturing the fee revenue from additional services, providing features that make business management simpler or more convenient can help small merchants focus on improving performance and growing sales, which in turn could bump Square’s fee revenue.

Evan Bakker and John Heggestuen, analysts at BI Intelligence, have compiled a detailed report on the payments ecosystem that drills into the industry to explain how a broad range of transactions are processed, including prepaid and store cards, as well as revealing which types of companies are in the best and worst position to capitalize on the latest industry trends.

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• 2016 will be a watershed year for the payments industry. Payments companies are improving security, expanding their mobile offerings, and building commerce capabilities that will give consumers a more compelling reason to make purchases using digital devices.
• Payments is an extremely complex industry. To understand the next big digital opportunity lies, it's critical to understand how the traditional credit- and debit-processing chain works and what roles acquirers, processors, issuing banks, card networks, independent sales organizations, gateways, and software and hardware providers play.
• Alternative technologies could disrupt the processing ecosystem. Devices ranging from refrigerators to smartwatches now feature payment capabilities, which will spur changes in consumer payment behaviors. Likewise, blockchain technology, the protocol that underlies Bitcoin, could one day change how consumer card payments are verified.

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• Provides charts on our latest forecasts, key company growth, survey results, and more.
• Analyzes the alternative technologies, including blockchain, which could further disrupt the ecosystem.

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