, Columnist
Apple Can Thank Alipay for Shopping
Jack Ma's First Data deal could boost everybody's payments systems.
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News that Alipay hooked up with First Data Corp. in the U.S. may end up being more significant for both the Chinese fintech player and for Apple Inc. than Jack Ma's $1.2 billion bid for an old-school payments provider, MoneyGram International Inc.
In one swoop, the payments affiliate of Ma's Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. gets access to 4 million U.S. merchants, not far behind the 4.5 million that Apple says are in its Apple Pay network.