With the recent Amazon / Whole Foods acquisition and the blinding speed at which that deal closed, it is hard for one to imagine Amazon as anything other than in the retail driving seat worldwide. Yet one recent Venture executive has penned a piece claiming that a pending alliance between Walmart and fintech Affirm could be an absolute retail industry game changer. Here are the 3 reasons he cited in the article for that position. Well worth the read, and isn't it interesting that the FINTECH angle is what he claims will change the equation back in Walmart's favor? A great read if you are following the retail sector or managing portfolios with either of these stocks in them.
(Cindy Taylor/Publisher)
"Over the last two weeks, retail has seen many big announcements. Amazon lowered prices on staple products at its newest toy, Whole Foods Market, and Walmart and Google unveiled their newest partnership surrounding Google Home and Google Express, as they both try to keep up with Amazon in the race for voice-activated commerce.As Shakespeare once said, "Misery acquaints a man with strange bedfellows."
Old Will sure wasn’t kidding.
While both of these announcements were huge in the retail world (with huge being the scientific term for very f-ing important), neither one was the most important retail announcement.
The most important revelation, in fact, was about a small startup called Affirm.
At the end of August, news flashed across the wire that Walmart and Affirm were close to finalizing a pilot deal with each other. This is a game changer for three critical reasons:1. Affirm was started by PayPal wunderkind Max Levchin
According to its website, Affirm is, "The financial company for everyday people. We offer affordable ways to buy online that are more flexible and transparent than any other credit option."...
2. Walmart is involved
All indications are that Walmart is aggressively going after scan-and-go/checkout-free shopping in their stores. Scan-and-go quite possibly will be the technology that most impacts physical retail in the next 10-15 years...3. Affirm and Walmart are a match made in heaven for budget conscious America
Affirm’s digital financing capabilities and Walmart’s scan-and-go capabilities, when combined, will stretch the bank accounts of all Americans — especially Americans who cannot afford Prime membership fees (uh oh Amazon)..."
Full Story at RetailDive