Facebook Inc. (FB), which has seen its stock quadruple since first going public, is now following Amazon.com Inc.’s (AMZN) lead as it seeks to expand into financial services as a part of efforts to offer more services to its users. The tech giant has been in talks with major banks, including JPMorgan Chase, Wells Fargo and Citigroup, about offering financial services like card transactions and checking-account balances on its Facebook Messenger platform, which already boasts 1.3 billion users, according to Barron’s.
While Amazon’s move into the sector pits it as a real competitive threat to the big banks, Facebook is taking the approach of partnering with them. But banks, whose market values pale in comparison, are a little skeptical, especially considering Facebook’s data-privacy issues.
