Amazon foray into financial services

Super interesting report about Amazon’s foray into financial services by CB Insights.

My key takeaways:

> Amazon is very focussed on reducing buying and selling friction
> Merchants are a key battle ground - making business easy and profitable for them is key - and growing merchant numbers is critical
> Need to service both merchants and customers
> At this point Amazon is not trying to become a bank but rather it is focussing on targeting specific banking services/solutions to remove friction and grow customer/merchant numbers
> Multiple products - Amazon Pay, digital wallet and payments network, biometric payments, voice payments via Alexa, Amazon Cash, Amazon business and consumer lending, and exploration of checking accounts and insurance.

This is a great read - thanks CB Insights!