FinTech News
Goldman Sachs Reportedly Looking to Sell Apple Card to Amex
It looks as though Goldman Sachs may be looking to pass on the Apple Card to another issuer — specifically American Express.
What’s happening:
According to the Wall Street Journal, Goldman Sachs is currently in talks with American Express to sell its Apple financial services portfolio. This would include the Apple Card as well as the recently-launched Apple Card Savings and Apple Pay Later “buy now, pay later” products.
Launched in 2019, the Apple Card was Goldman Sachs’ first credit card and marked a new venture for the bank as it looked to appeal to a wider array of consumers. However, while the card has seemingly been a winner for Apple, Goldman has reported seeing a $1 billion loss, due in part to a higher charge-off rate (what happens after customers fall more than six months behind on payments) than competitors. Nevertheless, the bank has continued to release new financial products with Apple, including the aforementioned Apple Card Savings account. While that product originally launched with an APY that bested Goldman’s own Marcus account, the latter’s interest rate has since been adjusted to match.
In addition to the Apple Card, Goldman also signed on to issue co-branded credit cards from General Motors. The WSJ story suggests that the bank is looking to transfer those programs to another issuer as well. Meanwhile, although Goldman was in talks to issue a T-Mobile card, such a deal fell through and they’ve stopped bidding on additional programs.
My thoughts:
As someone who’s a fan of American Express, I’d welcome their purchase of the Apple Card for the potential integrations that could come with it. For example, the ability to turn Daily Cash into MR cash (or vice versa) would definitely be interesting. Of course, even under the Amex umbrella, I’d venture a guess that Apple would want to keep its financial products as separate from the Amex ecosystem as possible.
In terms of how likely it is that a deal will go through, it’s nearly impossible to say. On the one hand, Amex has been making a series of deals with a number of FinTechs lately — although these partnerships are to have cards operate on their payment network and not to directly issue cards. It’s also unclear how much Goldman would want for the portfolio, whether Apple would need to okay a deal, etc. Nevertheless, it will definitely be interesting to see what comes of these talks (if anything) and whether the Apple Card ultimately does find a new home.
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