Today Apple officially announced its Tap to Pay product, which will allow merchants to accept payment simply by tapping their iPhones. I read this was in the works and shared it a few weeks back. Today’s announcement contains more details, including that Stripe will be the first platform to offer this product to its customers, including Shopify’s app, Point of Sale.

I’ve thought for some time that Apple could become a consumer bank. Apple already has a distribution network deployed to consumers via iPhones and has been adding financial products steadily over the last few years. As I think about this more, I believe it has a broader vision. Apple will become the bank for consumers and small to midsize businesses. It’s a massive market in a less-than-cutting-edge industry. This strategy will create a bigger moat around the iPhone and other hardware products while growing a new line of business. It’s ambitious and ingenious. Can’t way to see what other products Apple releases to support this strategy.

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