Simon Property, Afterpay Team Up as Holiday Season Approaches
Simon Property Group, Inc. SPG recently announced its collaboration with Afterpay to offer payment solutions to customers ahead of the busy holiday season. The nationwide collaboration is aimed at helping its retail tenants attract new customers and boost sales.
Afterpay, a leader in the "Buy Now, Pay Later" payment method, will offer a unique payment solution to the customers who shop from any of the Simon Property malls. The customers will now be able to make secure payments in four installments without any additional interest or upfront fees. Further, the service is free for customers, who pay their dues on time, and is also contactless.
To avail the service, customers can initiate the purchase in stores by tapping the card icon in the Afterpay app. This will activate the Afterpay wallet and customers can then buy with Apple Pay or Google Pay. Further, there are no merchant-integration costs as payments are made with the existing payment terminals of the retailers.
With the pandemic wreaking havoc through most of the year, retail REITs have been particularly hit hard. The industry has already been battling store closures and bankruptcy woes for some time. In addition, the social-distancing measures have resulted in dwindling footfalls in the company’s properties as more and more people prefer shopping online, thus, aggravating rent-collection woes.
However, Simon Property and its tenants would benefit from the latest tie up as the attractive payment solutions offered by Afterpay is likely to lure customers to retail properties again. The company has also been leveraging on the omni-channel strategy in a bid to navigate through the current turbulent environment.
Shares of this Zacks Rank #5 (Strong Sell) company have depreciated 49.6% over the past year compared with the industry's decline of 19.1%.
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Note: Anything related to earnings presented in this write-up represent funds from operations (FFO) — a widely used metric to gauge the performance of REITs.
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