SAO PAULO: A delivery app funded by SoftBank Rappi is expanding its financial product line in Brazil, launching credit cards for its users as the payments market in Latin America heats up. Rappi collaborated with Visa Inc to provide the credit cards, marking the fourth such collaboration between the two firms in Latin America, following previous debuts in Mexico, Colombia, and Peru. Rappi also intends to grow financial services in the five markets where it now operates.
Rappi believes that financial services will help increase the use of its delivery app, according to Joo Paulo Félix, CEO of RappiBank, a Brazilian digital bank that the business created earlier this year.
“It generates a positive cycle,” he said, adding that as Rappi learns more about its consumers and partners, it would be able to be more assertive in its lending offers.
Rappi, which launched in Brazil in 2017, is following in the footsteps of other major e-commerce businesses such as Mercadolibre, Magazine Luiza, and Via Varejo in developing financial solutions that are connected with their existing services.
Electronic payments in Brazil totaled 2 trillion reais (US$400.84 billion) last year, an increase of 8.2 percent from 2020.
Users of Rappi’s credit cards, which include the fee-free RappiGold and the RappiPrime Infinite, a premium card that will cost 89 reais a month, will get at least 3% cashback on Rappi purchases and at least 1% elsewhere.
Rappi provides restaurant operators and businesses with working capital credit lines. According to Félix, the app plans to introduce pet and mobile insurance products as well as become a full-service retail bank. (1 US dollar = 4.9895 reais) (Jimin Kang contributed reporting, Carolina Mandl contributed additional reporting, and Aurora Ellis edited the piece.)/n
