ANZ chief predicts mobile will kill off cards in less than a decade

Amazing. Under a decade. I wonder who will be slowing that down? It won't be the mobile OS manufacturers. I can photograph any of my cards and pull the information into Apple or Google pay within seconds. That's assuming the card provider will allow that. This is the same reaction I've seen since smart cards found their way into mobile phones as the SIM card in the early 1990s. The banks did not want to allow their data files to be copied from their bank card into the mobile phone SIM. Surely now the advent of the fintech startups and challenger banks is going to make all banks realise they really must change. Change whatever risk management policies they need to but allow people to copy the bank data into whatever electronic payment device a customer wants to use; a mobile phone, a wrist band, ring or other wearable. I want to do away with my wallet and the technology and the systems are available to do it.

Adoptiopn curves are always longer than what many industry experts predict. It took almost 20 years for ATMs to reach maturity. Debit card adoption was even longer. It took over 30 years to roll-out EMV globally. I can still remember my first EMV pilot in 1985. My best guess is a 20 year horizon for mobile maturity. There are just too many baby boomers that are going to live well into their nineties. This segment is most likely to keep doing things the way they have always done them. As for the subequent generations that is a completly different story. Their adoption curves will be much shorter provided there is a good "secure" value proposition. So for now I do not forsee the end of the plastic card in my lifetime.

Ten years ago, they said mobile wallets will replace credit cards. Then they slowly changed their tune and claimed that mobile wallets will replace the plastic form factor. Then they went quiet for a couple of years when even that didn't seem to be happening. Now, they're back again, claiming mobile wallets will replace plastic. I predict that, before they're even close to replacing plastic, mobile wallets will themselves get replaced by something else.

The value of replacing a payment card with a mobile is not that great, other than when I forget my wallet and the merchant accepts mobile payments. The value of replacing my wallet with an electronic wallet would be integration. No need for multiple loyalty cards, no need for health insurance cards which vary between business and private travel and by geography. Also integrate identity by having an electronic passport and electronic driving license stored on the mobile device. Also integrate airline boarding cards to replace the current clumsy mechanism of scanning barcodes on a mobile.

There are issues of course with battery life and losing your mobile but that is not very different to existing issues with magnetic stripes on cards and losing your wallet, they can all be solved.

@JamesPiggot + 1. Mobile Wallets: Fix What's Broken - And It Ain't Payments

In less than a decade death of the plastic! Well that will bode well in Australia and few other markets in Europe, the same cannot hold good for even other developed markets in Europe and US. Contactless usage, consumer subscription, and acceptance in individual markets will triangulate that growth and replacement timeline. 

There is credence in what ANZ cheif is saying specific to Australia. We are seeing that tremendous growth to contactless across Australia, Poland, Sweden, Netherlands, UK.. those are markets that will see consumers transition to mobile phones for payments while snapchatting away!