AT&T, Verizon plan to take on credit cards - The Boston Globe

Interesting financial times

AT&T Inc. and Verizon Wireless, the biggest US mobile carriers, are planning a venture to displace credit and debit cards with smartphones, posing a new threat to Visa Inc. and MasterCard Inc., three people with direct knowledge of the plan said.

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The trial would be the carriers’ biggest effort to spur mobile payments in the United States and supplant more than 1 billion plastic cards in American wallets. Smartphones have encroached on tasks ranging from Web browsing to street navigation and now may help the phone companies compete with Visa and MasterCard, the world’s biggest payments networks.

AT&T, Verizon plan to take on credit cards - The Boston Globe