Partnership with China UnionPay will see Apple Pay hitting the world's largest market next year.

Apple Pay, Apple's easy-to-use mobile payment system for iPhone, iPad, and Apple Watch, is coming to China in 2016 in cooperation with China UnionPay. Eddy Cue, Apple's senior vice president of Internet Software and Services, had this to say:

Apple Pay transforms everyday shopping and our China users will love the incredibly convenient and secure way to pay. We're thrilled to be working with 15 of the leading banks in China, who have signed on to support Apple Pay, including Agricultural Bank of China, Bank of China, Bank of Guangzhou, Bank of Shanghai, China Construction Bank, China Ever-bright Bank, China Guangfa Bank, China CITIC Bank, China Merchants Bank, China Minsheng Bank, Industrial Bank, Industrial and Commercial Bank of China, Ping An Bank, Postal Savings Bank of China and Shanghai Pudong Development Bank.

Apple Pay launched in the U.S. in October of 2014. In 2015 it expanded to the U.K. and, recently, Canada and Australia thanks to American Express. Amex has also said it will be bringing Apple Pay to Spain, Singapore, and Hong Kong in 2016 as well.

In the U.S., Apple Pay is now accepted for credit and debit card use by every major network. 2,500 banks support it and over 1.5 million U.S. retail locations will accept it by the end of 2015. Starbucks, a pioneer in digital payments, will also start accepting Apple Pay starting in 2016.

China, in addition to being a mobile-first market, is an increasingly important one for Apple. The addition of Apple Pay, with it's blend of security and convenience, won't just make transactions easier and safer, they'll make Apple's ecosystem even more valuable.

Another 58 banks and credit unions in the U.S. have added support for Apple Pay. These new additions bring the total number U.S. financial institutions supporting the system to 913. Check out the list below to see if your bank made the cut.

• Air Academy Federal Credit Union
• Ballston Spa National Bank
• Bank of Commerce
• BankFive
• BNA Bank
• Capital Area Federal Credit Union
• Citizens National Bank
• Comenity Bank
• CommonWealth One Federal Credit Union
• Community Business Bank
• Community State Bank
• CoreFirst Bank & Trust
• Damascus Community Bank
• Denison Bank
• Diablo Valley Federal Credit Union
• Electrical Federal Credit Union
• Financial Center First Credit Union
• First State Bank of Arcadia
• Florence Savings Bank
• "FNB Bank, N.A."
• Fox Communities Credit Union
• Franklin Synergy Bank
• Fulton Bank of New Jersey
• "Fulton Bank, N.A."
• Hercules Credit Union
• HFS Federal Credit Union
• Iberville Bank
• Inspirus Credit Union
• Isabella Community Credit Union
• Lafayette Ambassador Bank
• Landmark Bank
• Latino Community Credit Union
• Linn Area Credit Union
• Machias Savings Bank
• Maps Credit Union
• McCoy Federal Credit Union
• Mercantile Bank
• Nicolet National Bank
• Ontario-Montclair School Employees Federal Credit Union
• Pacific Marine Credit Union
• Palmetto Citizens Federal Credit Union
• Pen Air Federal Credit Union
• Platinum Bank
• Red Rocks Credit Union
• Rockland Trust
• Saginaw Medical Federal Credit Union
• Simmons Bank
• StonehamBank
• Swineford National Bank
• Texas Bank and Trust
• The Columbia Bank
• The Evangeline Bank & Trust Co
• The First National Bank of Mount Dora
• The National Bank of Indianapolis
• Valliance Bank
• Wauchula State Bank
• West Central Bank
• Westmark Credit Union

Apple Pay allows those with either an iPhone 6 or newer to pay for purchases with their phone. The system saw a great deal of expansion throughout 2015. In addition to the 855 banks in the U.S., the system is now available through 15 banks in the U.K., and recently expanded to Canada and Australia through a partnership between Apple and American Express.

Source: Apple

Ed: Welcome to this week's edition of The Pixel Project: a weekly comic from Diesel Sweeties' Rich Stevens on Apple, technology, and everything in-between. Today: Just Add Wheels

Read more comics from The Pixel Project.

U.S. Bank has announced that it has added support for Apple Pay to its FlexPerks American Express Credit Cards. FlexPerks cards offer reward points each time a customer makes a purchase, and points can be spent on a wide variety of items. Apple Pay works with the following cards

• U.S. Bank FlexPerks Reserve American Express Card.
• U.S. Bank FlexPerks Travel Rewards American Express Card.
• U.S. Bank FlexPerks Select+ American Express Card.

With this announcement, U.S. Bank says that all of their credit and debit cards are now compatible with Apple Pay. U.S. Bank customers can add their FlexPerks cards to Apple Pay right now.

Source: U.S. Bank

Apple Pay has gained support from another 55 banks and credit unions in the United States. Cards issued by these financial institutions should now be compatible with Apple's contactless payment system. The total number of banks and credit unions supporting Apple Pay now stands at 967.

Did your bank make the cut? Check the list below to find out:

• 1st MidAmerica Credit Union
• Achieve Financial Credit Union
• Advantage Federal Credit Union
• Alloy Federal Credit Union
• Altoona First Savings Bank
• Altura Credit Union
• Amalgmated Bank of Chicago
• Associated Credit Union of Texas
• Bank of Ann Arbor
• Beehive Federal Credit Union
• Brand Banking Company
• Business Bank of St. Louis
• Capitol Credit Union
• Charlotte State Bank & Trust
• Citizens Bank (AL)
• Citizens Savings Bank
• Community Credit Union
• Credit Union of Texas
• Earthmover Credit Union
• Employment Security Credit Union
• Family Trust Federal Credit Union
• First Community Bank of Beemer
• First Interstate Bank
• First Service Federal Credit Union
• First State Community Bank
• Fort Community Credit Union
• Georgia Bank and Trust
• HomeStar and Financial Services
• Houston Highway Credit Union
• IDB-IIC Federal Credit Union
• Jefferson Financial Credit Union
• Katahdin Federal Credit Union
• Lion's Share Federal Credit Union
• Mainstreet Community Bank of Florida
• Marine Bank & Trust
• Marine Federal Credit Union
• Monona State Bank
• Navy Army Community Credit Union
• Northway Bank
• Oakworth Capital Bank
• Plaza Park State Bank
• Reliant Community Credit Union
• Security Bank and Trust Company
• Silver State Schools Credit Union
• Spencer County Bank
• Summit Community Bank
• Sundance State Bank
• Sunrise Banks N.A.
• The Commerce Bank of Washington
• Tioga State Bank
• Torrance Community Credit Union
• Total Community Credit Union
• Triangle Credit Union
• United Community Bank
• USNY Bank

Apple Pay allows those with either an iPhone 6 or newer to pay for purchases with their phone. In addition to the banks in the U.S., the system is now available through 15 banks in the UK, and recently expanded to both Australia and Canada thanks to a partnership between Apple and American Express.

Source: Apple

Barclays has yet to launch support for Apple Pay, but the UK bank insisted it will full fill its promise to customers to have Apple's payment platform added early 2016. Barclays CEO Ashok Vaswani has attempted to clear up confusion and stem the riots by confirming that they're looking to launch Apple Pay support within the next 60 to 75 days.

In an email response to a customer, Vaswani set the dates in stone:

Barclays Executive confirms #applepay launch date. At last! pic.twitter.com/5wuzMoGs4V

— Oli Foster-Burnell (@orfoster) January 25, 2016

The supplied time frame puts Apple Pay hitting Barclays by mid-April at the latest. Once Barclays has finally given the green light, customers with an account will then be able to connect their card(s) to Apple Pay and enjoy a contactless experience using nothing more than their iPhone in transactions.

Source: Oli Foster-Burnell (Twitter), via: Engadget

Apple Pay may soon make its way to ATMs from Bank of America and Wells Fargo. Both companies are said to be working on a project to make the contactless payment system compatible with ATM transactions, allowing customers to view bank balances, withdraw money, and more.

Engineers from both banks have been hard at work on such a program, according to a new report from TechCrunch

When I pressed harder and asked if that meant Apple Pay would likely be one of those mobile wallets, he admitted with a laugh "I think that's a good assessment." When asked about whether its ATMs would work with Apple Pay, Bank Of America's Consumer Banking Products press representative Betty Riess told me "We already have number of mobile wallet programs…" implying Apple Pay could join them.

When it's supported in stores, restaurants, and other outlets, Apple Pay can replace a customer's use of their credit or debit card. It would be useful if banks would make it possible for Apple Pay to come into play for other card-releated transactions as well.

Source: TechCrunch

Square has announced that its new contactless reader is now available in Apple Retail Stores. With this reader, merchants can add Apple Pay support to their business. You can get your hands on the reader for $49.

From Square on Twitter:

As of this tweet, our new Apple Pay reader is available in every Apple Store across the U.S. pic.twitter.com/XiimfYJMY6

— Square (@Square) February 3, 2016

In addition to NFC-based payment systems like Apple Pay, Square's new reader also supports EMV chip cards, which are still fairly new in the U.S. All a merchant has to to is connect their iPhone or iPad to the reader, set up a Square profile, and they can easily start accepting payments.

While it is currently available in Apple Retail Stores, Square's contactless reader does is not yet available in Apple's online store.

Source: Square (Twitter)

Apple Pay is now accepted in two million locations in the U.S., UK, Canada, and Australia, with more companies announcing plans to roll out support. Online retailer Zappos will soon add the option to use the payment system to its iPhone app. More restaurants and retailers like Chick-fil-A and Crate & Barrel will be adding support for Apple Pay as well.

From Business Times:

"We've been getting requests from customers to use Apple Pay for quite a while," said Aki Iida, head of mobile for Zappos. "It makes the customer experience easier, why not try it?"

These are just the latest companies to announce support for Apple Pay. The system will be making its way to Starbucks, KFC, and more later this year.

Source: Business Times; Via: MacRumors

Apple Pay adoption continues to truck along, with another 32 banks and credit unions in the U.S. adding support for the system. These latest additions brings the total number of U.S. financial institutions supporting Apple Pay to 999.

Check out below to see if your bank is on the list:

• Anderson Brothers Bank
• Bank & Trust Company
• Bank of Labor
• Bank of Yazoo
• BankWest
• Brown County State Bank
• Busey Bank
• Campbell & Fetter Bank
• Central Bank of Oklahoma
• Collinsville Savings Society
• Core Bank
• Covantage Credit Union
• Diversified Members Credit Union
• Farmington Bank
• Florida Parishes Bank
• Fort Worth Community Credit Union
• Great Midwest Bank
• Horizon Bank, N.A.
• Litchfield Bancorp
• Luther Burbank Savings
• Mississippi National Guard Federal Credit Union
• Oregon Community Credit Union
• Pathfinder Bank
• Platinum Federal Credit Union
• Qualstar Credit Union
• Red River Bank
• Seven Seventeen Credit Union
• T Bank
• The Citizens Bank
• Titonka Savings Bank
• US Employees O.C. Federal Credit Union
• Wallis State Bank

Apple's contactless payment system has recently seen increasing support not only from banks, but also a number of merchants. Apple Pay is now accepted at two million locations across the U.S., UK, Canada, and Australia, with several more retailers and restaurants planning support for later in 2016, including Starbucks, KFC, and Chick-fil-A.

Source: Apple

If you've found yourself unable to add your Visa debit or credit card to Apple Pay this morning, you're not alone. The payment service is currently experiencing some sort of disruption at the moment, and Apple is working to fix it.

Apple posted the following message to its system status page:

Some users unable to add Visa debit and credit cards to Apple Pay.

The outage has been ongoing since a little after 4:00 a.m. this morning. It does not appear to be affecting cards from other providers at the moment, so Apple Pay should behave normally for most other users.

We'll be sure to let you know when the disruption has been resolved.

Source: Apple

Apple Pay will reportedly be launching in China on Thursday, February 18. Additionally, the system is said to be heading to France at some point in 2016.

In response to questions about the arrival of Apple Pay, China Guangfa Bank's official WeChat account replied that the system would arrive on February 15 at 5:00 a.m. local time. From Tech in Asia:

That information comes via the public WeChat account of China Guangfa Bank credit cards. Since those cards, like all UnionPay cards, will be able to connect with Apple Pay, the bank's WeChat account is dispensing information about Apple Pay, and the available menu options include a query about when Apple Pay will be available. If you select that option, the account will tell you it's coming to China on February 18, at 5:00 am. It also says you'll need iOS 9.2 or later or Watch OS 2.1 or later to be able to use it.

At the end of 2015, Apple announced a partership with Chinese payment provider UnionPay to bring Apple Pay to China early this year.

According to the folks over at iGen, Apple Pay will also be heading to France later this year. It is thought that a number of banks and card providers will be on board for the launch, unlike the expansions into Canada and Australia, which came thanks to a partnership between Apple and American Express.

Apple Pay was originally released in the United States in late 2014. It made its first expansion outside of the U.S. to the UK in July 2015, before arriving in Canada and Australia in November. The system is also set to expand into Spain, Singapore, and Hong Kong at some point this year.

Source: Tech In Asia, iGen (French); Via: 9to5Mac

Another Chinese bank has stated that Apple Pay will arrive in China on Thursday, February 18. The announcement from Industrial and Commercial Bank of China (ICBC) follows earlier reports of the February 18 launch date from China Guangfa Bank and China Construction Bank Corp.

From Reuters:

Apple Inc's Apple Pay mobile payment system will be available in China from Feb. 18 for Industrial and Commercial Bank of China Ltd customers, bank representatives said in social media posts on Tuesday. The technology giant had previously said the system would launch in China in early 2016, making it Apple Pay's fifth country as it accelerates development of a planned new revenue stream. ICBC is China's biggest lender by assets.

Apple Pay will arrive in China thanks to a partnership between Apple and UnionPay, China's domestic bank card provider. The system has previously expanded into the UK, Canada, and Australia, following its launch in the U.S. in October 2014.

Source: Reuters

Apple Pay has officially launched in China with support for more than 80% of the country's credit and debit cards.

Just two months after Apple first announced it's intention to bring Apple Pay to China, the mobile transaction service has now been officially launched. Reuters reports:

The U.S. firm has 19 of China's biggest lenders as partners. That means 80 percent of China's credit and debit cards are eligible for Apple Pay, usable at about one-third of all locations that accept those cards, Apple's Bailey said.

Apple partnered with China UnionPay to bring Apple Pay to the country, making it the fifth launch country behind the U.S., UK, Australia and Canada. While Apple Pay has enjoyed rapid growth since its 2014 launch, garnering support from over 1,000 banks in the U.S. and a total of 2 million merchant locations, China has the potential to accelerate that momentum by quite a bit thanks to the size of the market.

In a related announcement, Apple has informed developers that they can now support Apple Pay in their apps for customers in China:

You can now support Apple Pay for your customers in China, providing an easy, secure, and private way for them to pay using their China UnionPay credit and debit cards. Apple Pay lets users buy physical goods and services within your app without having to enter payment or contact information.

Will you be using Apple Pay in China? Let us know!

While initial reports indicated that customers in China were encountering errors when trying to add cards to Apple Pay, it seems that this was intentional on Apple's part. The company was evidently enacting a staged rollout of the service across China, which led to some customers being unable to add their cards right away. This had initially been reported as an error due to strain on Apple Pay's infrastructure.

From 9to5Mac:

Apple has since informed us that the statement by a local representative was not an official statement and has been mistranslated from the Chinese by Caixan. The correct information is that the ability to add cards was being made available on a rolling basis throughout the day.

According to Mashable, about 38 million cards had been registered with Apple Pay by 5 p.m. China Time on Feb. 17, with 10 million cards added in the first hour.

Apple Pay official launched in China on Thursday, Feb. 18. The launch comes thanks to a partnership between Apple and UnionPay, China's domestic bank card provider. China is the fifth country in which Apple Pay has launched, following the U.S., UK, Canada, and Australia.

Source: 9to5Mac, Mashable

At Mobile World Congress this week, MasterCard announced that it plans to roll out a new 'selfie'-based authentication method for online purchases.

After successful tests of the service in the U.S. and UK, MasterCard says that it will offer the authentication option, which involves using a smartphone, tablet or PC app in conjunction with a front-facing camera to verify a person's identity after entering credit card information, in 14 countries this summer.

Initially rolling out in the UK, U.S., Canada, Netherlands, Belgium, Spain, Italy, France, Germany, Switzerland, Norway, Sweden, Finland and Denmark, MasterCard says that its test base far preferred the selfie option to that of a password, which is currently required by MasterCard and its competitor, Visa, when making online purchases.

Since most online purchases are still made on devices with larger screens, such as tablets or laptops, MasterCard has built in a handoff workflow that sends a push notification to a smartphone, which opens the payment company's verification app. iPhone customers will also be able to use the Touch ID sensor on devices released after 2013.

From the BBC:

"Consumers hate passwords," declared Ajay Bhalla, chief of the firm's safety and security division. "We know the most commonly used password is 123456, so they are not secure, and people also use the same passwords for multiple sites. If one site gets hacked all the places that you use the same password get compromised - they are a big pain.

"In the modern world everyone has a mobile phone and there is internet connectivity everywhere. So, we should be able to use biometrics [instead] to authenticate ourselves."

MasterCard is also testing another form of biometric authentication in the form of electrocardiogram, or EKG, wearables. Partnering with Toronto-based Nymi, MasterCard completed the first mobile payment using a EKG-based wristband, the Nymi Band, in mid-2015. Heartbeat authentication is considered considerably more difficult to mimic or hack, since after an initial identity check, the wearer provides "constant authentication," according to MasterCard's Bhalla. It's unclear when MasterCard plans to roll out EKG authentication to the masses, but it won't be until the infrastructure is more mature; very few smartphones or wearables provide 24-hour heart rate monitoring today.

Companies like Microsoft and Google have been using facial recognition to authenticate users for some years, but MasterCard would be the first company to do so for payments.

According to a MasterCard study, nine out of 10 people prefer biometric authentication over having to remember alphanumeric passwords, and three-quarters of respondents believe that it will decrease fraud.

Source: MasterCard

MasterCard is offering those who have their cards added to Apple Pay the opportunity to travel the London Underground network free of charge. Simply touch in and out with Apple Pay on Mondays until March 14 and you'll not be charged.

Should you be interested in learning how you'll be able to use your MasterCard and Apple Pay to travel across Transport for London services, sit through the helpful demonstration video below:

The promotion, which kicks off on Feb. 29, will allow you to touch in using your iPhone or Apple Watch. Do note that this offer is only available to those with a MasterCard and runs every Monday until March 14.

Source: MasterCard

Apple Pay will reportedly arrive in France by the end of the year, though it may roll out slowly following an initial trial period. Apple is said to have been in negotiations with French banks for months, with the percentage of the transaction fee taken by Apple being the primary issue. Despite this issue, however, it seems that Apple Pay could be on track for a wide rollout by September.

From LesEchos (translated from French), via 9to5Mac:

Visa has also tested in 2015 with four French institutions a mobile payment solution based on technology "host card emulation" (HCE) - it uses an online storage system (cloud) - which already allows them to connect to the interface of the international network linking up with Apple Pay. To get started quickly, some actors may therefore choose to pass by Visa. Apple is nevertheless imposing a pilot period of three to five months, and Apple Pay should not be launched widespread in France before September.

France would just be another of the major countries that Apple is targeting for an Apple Pay rollout in 2016. The company has already expanded the system into China, and will reportedly bring it to countries like Spain, Hong Kong, and Singapore before the end of the year.

Apple Pay will eventually be more than just a way to quickly make payments in-store and in-app. But how it evolves depends on the scope of Apple's ambitions.

Apple Pay is just over 15 months old and supported in five countries, including the U.S., U.K., Canada, Australia, and, most recently, China. But along the way, the company has faced criticism from banks, merchants, and customers, all frustrated by limitations of the service's capabilities.

Unfortunately for Apple, many of Apple Pay's irksome issues are completely out of the company's control. As with Apple's rumored TV streaming service, other companies have sufficient leverage to make demands of the world's biggest corporation. In the case of Apple Pay, it's credit card-issuing banks and local merchants.

From there to here

Like most mobile payment systems, Apple Pay began with a modest proposal: to simplify and secure credit card payments by removing the need for a physical card.

When Apple Pay debuted in 2014, it became apparent that Apple made the right decision in partnering with the banks — the companies that issue credit cards on behalf of payment networks Visa and MasterCard — because there are nearly 200 million Americans with credit cards, and disrupting an industry of that size and complexity takes time.

Rather than forge off on its own path separate from the banks and merchants, Apple did what it does best: The company made the right deals and adopted the right burgeoning standards. It built Apple Pay with EMV (Europay, MasterCard, and Visa) chip-and-pin and tokenization in mind, hoping it would incentivize merchants to upgrade their terminals in support of NFC (near field communications)-based tap-to-pay, which Apple Pay relies on.

In addition, Apple emphasized the security angle: EMV technology substitutes a credit card's magnetic stripe for a small storage chip, which has proven to be more difficult to clone and nearly impossible to hack using person-in-the-middle interception attacks.

Tokenization pushes that security aspect forward further by randomizing a credit card's PAN — the 12 digits we all know as our credit card numbers — so that only the current payment network knows the real numbers. Should an interloper get ahold of those tokenized numbers, they will either be useless, or only useful for one or two transactions. Once the token has been disabled, access is cut off, saving your credit card from being cancelled in the event of fraud.

Apple Pay also forces customers to use a second factor of authentication: a fingerprint. Using biometrics such as Apple's Touch ID sensor, the payment network is reassured that the person making the payment is actually the credit card's owner; the merchant is reassured, from a liability standpoint, of the same thing.

A growth market(s)

Mobile payments are tricky, because every country has infrastructure influenced by government regulations and anti-fraud practices. In the U.S., Apple Pay launched around the time Visa and MasterCard shifted fraud liability to merchants for payments made using a credit card's magnetic stripe.

That means that if a merchant accepts a magnetic stripe-based payment from a stolen credit card, they must pay back those funds. Payment networks like Visa and MasterCard believe that EMV-based payments are the future, and have been pushing their adoption in countries like Canada, Australia, the UK, Spain and many others since 2010. They're now confident enough in the underlying technology that they are willing to wear the financial burden of merchant fraud.

Unfortunately, one of Apple Pay's biggest pain points in the U.S. is still the overall lack of acceptance at merchants. By Apple's own count, the service is accepted at over two million "locations" in the five launch countries, but many big-name brands like CVS and Walmart have either refused to support the service, or have supported a competitor like CurrentC, which woefully lacks both security and scruples.

It's a different story entirely in Canada, where I live, as well as the UK and Australia. Here (and there), most merchants have either already upgraded to NFC-capable payment terminals, which let credit card owners tap their physical cards against a terminal to pay without entering a PIN or signing a receipt, up to a pre-determined amount — usually between $50 and $100.

That convenience has also been a huge stumbling block to adoption in countries with mature payments infrastructures. While tapping an iPhone — or even better, Apple Watch — to a payment terminal may seem sufficiently incredible, most people I talked to actively avoid Apple Pay, or regularly forget about it. For many people, bringing payments to the phone, even with the added security benefits, just isn't enough.

The merchant of payments

Linda Mantia is the executive vice-president of cards and payment solutions at RBC, and has become a key representative on the future of mobile payment growth in North America. Under her tutelage, RBC launched its Cloud Payments platform. It allowed Canada's largest bank (by user numbers) to move beyond traditional forms of payment credential storage.

RBC is also an issuer of credit cards with partner, Visa. Mantia has helped launch one of Canada's strongest Android-based mobile payment products, utilizing a feature called Host Card Emulation to remove the onus on the customer from having to buy the right secure SIM card with the right phone just to make a payment in a store.

But Mantia says that the mobile payment revolution won't actually begin until Apple Pay arrives in Canada, and she says this knowing it was launched with American Express late last year. Like Americans, Canadians and Australians oversubscribe to credit cards, and most of them are issued by Visa (over 60%) or MasterCard (over 25%). She also acknowledges that mobile payments won't really gain mass adoption until they can be do more than just make secure payments.

Evolving Apple Pay

When we talk about mobile payments, we usually refer to the core feature of what's quickly becoming known as the digital wallet. Like a physical wallet, not everything inside it is intended as a payment output. Most people carry licenses, gift and loyalty cards, photos, receipts, and even cash, all of which is being increasingly digitized and indexed by various startups.

Apple's Wallet, née Passbook, performed some of these functions well before the company launched Apple Pay. Since iOS 6 in 2012, Wallet has been storing boarding passes, loyalty cards and movie tickets, using a variety of techniques, such as GPS coordinates and beacons, to surface them when they're most needed.

Today, loyalty and payments are loosely connected in the Wallet experience. My local grocery store may accept Apply Pay, but my iPhone has no idea that is has a loyalty program. Some loyalty programs are supported by the service, but tighter integration — and automation— is key to ensuring people return to Apple Pay. I've also heard from people that Apple Pay should have a closer tie to the merchants themselves, allowing customers to not only pay within the stores, but redeem coupons and rebates without having to enter third-party apps. While this would be challenging to engineer, a combination of iBeacons, in-store Wi-Fi, and indoor mapping could vastly improve the shopping experience.

But perhaps the most longed-for Apple Pay feature has nothing to do with the physical store. I've heard from so many people that they want a way to more easily send and receive money using iMessage. Moreover, calls for a peer-to-peer Apple Pay API are growing, which would allow developers to integrate bi-directional payments into their apps, using Apple as a secure conduit for transfers.

These features, more than additional locations, is what will really drive the evolution of Apple Pay from a transactional system into a full fledged platform.

What do you want to see Apple Pay turn into? Let us know in the comments below!

A reported launch roadmap from MasterCard seems to indicate that Apple Pay will be heading to Japan, Brazil, Hong Kong and Singapore by the end of 2016. The purported roadmap, which was leaked by 9to5Mac, also indicates that Apple Pay may add support for MasterCard in Canada before the end of 2016 as well. Apple Pay in Canada currently only supports American Express cards.

If the launch roadmap is to be believed, 2016 could be a big year for Apple Pay's expansion. The mobile payments platform already made its debut in China earlier in February, and France is also rumored to see a rollout this year.