- PayPal Holdings, Inc (NASDAQ:PYPL) helped provoke a formal antitrust complaint against Apple Inc (NASDAQ:AAPL) and its iPhone payments system by raising concerns with the European Commission, Bloomberg reports.
- Tap-to-pay services rely on near-field communications. Apple allegedly only lets its payment system use the iPhone's NFC chip.
- Apple's act hampered PayPal, Block, Inc's (NYSE:SQ) Cash App, Samsung Electronics Co, Ltd (OTC:SSNLF), and Alphabet Inc's (NASDAQ:GOOG) (NASDAQ:GOOGL) Google.
- European regulators accused Apple of allegedly abusing its influence over mobile payments by reserving the iPhone's tap-to-pay abilities for its own Apple Pay service.
- In 2022 Apple will begin letting third parties use the iPhone's NFC chip to accept payments but will prohibit consumers with rival services from making payments that way.
- The commission alleged that it creates an unequal playing field.
- PayPal, which has its payment service, offers a tap-to-pay option on Android phones and wants to provide the same feature on Apple's iPhone.
- Apple has defended its approach by saying that Apple Pay rivals, including PayPal, were still popular on the iPhone even without a tap-to-pay option. It also noted that Apple Pay already supports 2,500 banks in Europe.
- Price Action: PYPL shares traded lower by 0.63% at $90.95 in the premarket on the last check Tuesday.
