The UK Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) has stated that the behavior of the three major US payment giants—PayPal, Mastercard, and Visa—related to PayPal's digital wallet is suspected of anti-competitive practices. The agency has launched an antitrust investigation into these three companies.
The FCA indicated that this investigation originated from a digital wallet industry report jointly released by the FCA and the Payment Systems Regulator last year, focusing on the use and fund operation models of PayPal's digital wallet.
According to the Financial Times, PayPal users in the UK can link and manage up to 24 different bank cards within their digital wallet without incurring additional service fees. Users can also enjoy specified payment cashback, cross-border remittance, and jointly manage funds with other users.
In addition, the FCA will also investigate Mastercard and Visa for allegedly abusing their market dominance.
The FCA emphasized that it is currently collecting relevant evidence and has not yet reached a conclusion as to whether the three companies have violated UK competition law. All three companies have stated that they are cooperating with the investigation.
The FCA acquired competition enforcement powers in 2015, allowing it to impose fines of up to 10% of a company’s global annual revenue for breaches of competition law.