What will money be like in 2020?

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In recent years, with the spread of advanced mobile technologies, particularly smartphones, consumers have become increasingly accustomed to the fact that a phone can be used to transfer money, buy goods , or perform other financial transactions.

A recent Pew Research Center Internet study found that one in 10 Americans has donated to a charity at least once via text message from their phone; that more than a third of smartphone owners have used their devices for banking services, such as paying bills or checking their balances; and that 46% of all apps they purchased were purchased using their mobile devices. According to a comScore study, 38% of smartphone owners have made some kind of purchase using their gadgets. The most popular categories of mobile retail were digital content (music, e-books, and movies), apparel and accessories, tickets, and discounted items.

A 2012 report by the US Federal Reserve also shows that 21% of mobile phone nursing homes email database owners have used mobile banking services in the past year, and that another 11% plan to do so in the coming year. The most popular service was checking bank balances and recent transaction history (used by 90% of those who used mobile banking services). In second place was transferring money between different bank accounts (42%). Another 12% made payments using their mobile phones in the past year: paying bills on the World Wide Web or transferring funds to another person’s account.

Mobile phones play an even more important role in the financial systems of developing countries. In Kenya, for example, the SMS money transfer system M-Pesa operates , whose users send each other an amount equal to 20% of the country's GDP per year.

In light of these trends, many financial institutions and technology companies have decided to embrace the integration of mobile devices into the multi-billion dollar retail and services economy. As a result, infrastructure and tools for secure mobile shopping have rapidly evolved in recent years.

Today, there are several types of mobile payment and transaction solutions. Some allow merchants and retailers to accept credit card payments on the go, using mobile card readers that plug into a smartphone or tablet. Others allow money to be transferred directly from one user to another using mobile phones, either by physically touching one device to another or by exchanging phone numbers or email addresses.

There are other, even more advanced solutions that make the mobile phone the main tool of the user's financial life, combining the functions of a payment device, identification system, coupon book and financial planner. In late 2011, Google, together with Citibank and MasterCard, launched Google Wallet. Using near - field communication ( NFC) technology, Google Wallet allows users to save payment information in the cloud and pay for goods from participating retailers by tapping their phone on the device in a store.