Facebook may face trust challenge in consumer finance move

Facebook has revealed the arrival of a person-to-person payment system. Payments will initially be available only to US users, and will run on the existing banking rails, with users needing to add a MasterCard or Visa debit card while making the first transaction.

According to a report from Lafferty Group, aside from the mechanics of the transactions, Facebook will have to confront the fact that its users may be reluctant to invest faith in Facebook as a financial conduit.

The study states that Facebook is trying to meet market expectations that it will move eventually into payments and by registering debit cards of its users it may be easing the way to enabling direct payments to businesses advertising on the platform.