Jul. 6 at 5:35 PM
$CPNG
Coupang, the “Amazon of South Korea”, controls close to 40% of the country’s e-commerce market and serves almost half the population. That made me think Coupang must have a strong Fintech arm, just like Mercado Libre with Mercado Pago or Sea with Shopee.
But I was wrong. Coupang’s Fintech business is limited to a wallet, Coupang Pay, and a co-branded credit card. Limited disclosures suggest that these products have a marginal contribution to the company’s top line. So what happened? My conclusion is that Coupang lost the wallet war.
South Korea experienced a major shift from card payments to mobile wallets, and Coupang was late to respond. Samsung, Naver, KakaoPay, and Toss had already built strong footholds and expanded beyond payments. If you control payments, you earn the right to offer loans, insurance, and investments.
Coupang missed that chance.
👇🏻
https://www.popularfintech.com/p/how-coupang-missed-the-fintech-opportunity-0657a29435b0a246
