[mongol]

Not familiar with Square but Swish started as an app for payment between individuals, such as friends sharing a restaurant bill or payment of used things (think Craigslist etc). People even use it as payment for used cars. It was developed by all major banks in cooperation, so huge network effect from start, uses the well established "mobile bank id" for authorization and is instant and currently free. The instantaneousness means that you feel safe to hand over the keys (in the car sale case) the moment your app beeps to confirm the transfer, which is within a few seconds after the buyer authorized it on his phone.

Later a version for merchants was developed.

[muninn_]

Ok that makes sense. I work in finance and was wondering about what other countries/companies are doing. Thanks for the info.

One thing that I was thinking about though was about the regulations and scare around security might be hindering development here in the U.S. .

Again, thanks for the info.

[mongol]

Some additional info: your phone number is identifying the transfer target, and is associated with your debit bank account number behind. So you don't have to share anything additional, if your friend or the buyer has your phone number he can initiate a transaction.