Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:APPL) suddenly started showing off its new and unexpected partnership with payments giant Visa Inc. (NYSE:V).
What Happened: Apple Cash virtual debit cards are seemingly switching from Discover Financial Services (NYSE:DFS) Visa, according to a Friday report by MacRumors.
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Until now, Apple was creating Apple Cash virtual debit cards on the Discover network thanks to a partnership with the Green Dot Corporation (NYSE:GDOT), but now new cards are generated on the Visa network and bear its logo.
It is unclear whether the company plans to soon reissue Visa cards to all Discover virtual cardholders, but all it takes for a user to make a transition is to deactivate Apple Cash in settings and reactivate it again.
Switching to Visa entails clear advantages for Apple Cash users, especially considering that it is more widely accepted than Discovery is.
This is the latest expansion of Apple's financial technology offering, with reports published earlier this month indicating that it enabled payment processing firm Ayden to use the near-field communication (NFC) antenna on its mobile devices to process contactless payments.
Photo: Apple