Mobile Payment: Economic Models and Financial Regulation

In recent years, a new means of payment tries to emerge: the mobile payment. Despite its advantages, the adoption of mobile payment seems to take time, especially when are neglected the immediate extensions to the mobile Internet of the payment services already in use online. One of the causes is that mobile payment service providers are not restricted to traditional operators of payment: these potential partners do not fully cooperate for the definition of one single economic model and jointly slowdown the rhythm of adoption of the new service. Regulators, already appealed during the implementation of online payment, will have an important role to play for the determination of the relevant model of distribution of the new service. This article first considers the available economic models of m-payment and the respective interactions they define between service providers and users, before discussing the institutional framework able to control from a “public economics” view this new form of monetary circulation.