Snapchat Update Lets Users Send Money to Friends

It might not seem wise to let a bunch of young kids send money to each other, but Snapchat is in desperate need to show investors it can generate revenue. In partnership with Square – a finance and merchant supplier – Snapchat will now offer a simple way to send people money on the fly, using the same app to send photos and videos.

Users will be able to set up a credit/debit card on Snapchat and immediately send money to friends. Want to split the pizza bill? Forgot to pay your friend back for the taxi? Now Snapchat offers a simple way without the need for a PayPal address or sort code/account number. It is a smart platform that millions of people use everyday, making it much more likely to attract users who might not send money via direct debit or use PayPal. It almost makes you wonder why Facebook and Twitter don’t already offer this service.

Snapchat’s numbers are not publicly available – it is expected the startup has more than 50 million users worldwide – but it is how long users are on the app everyday that makes Snapchat a rather expensive startup.

Tinder already broke charts with users on the app for 77 minutes of everyday, doubling the numbers for Facebook. Snapchat reportedly has a large retention rate, bringing users back for over an hour.

Snapchat is currently valued at over $4 billion, without making any money on the app. This new payment service should bring in a small cut of each transaction back to Snapchat, although it is certainly not going to bring the startup to profitability.