TikTok has added Must Eat, a restaurant guide that draws on more than 40 million posts and comments for recommendations by city, cuisine and price, TechCrunch reports. According to earlier reports, the company is also developing a way to send money through direct messages, based on TikTok Pay, which already operates in Southeast Asia. It has also applied in Brazil for permission to offer lending and payment services. Together with TikTok Shop, these moves point to a shift towards a WeChat-style super app.

What it means: Large social platforms want to keep users inside the app all the way from discovering a product or restaurant to paying for it. TikTok has an edge because it already shapes the buying decisions of many younger consumers, and payments would give it transaction data and commission income. In Europe such an expansion would require an e-money or payment institution licence and bring the company under anti-money laundering and consumer protection supervision, while as a very large platform it already has DSA obligations. For Greek restaurants, cafés and retailers, Must Eat shows that TikTok is becoming a discovery channel on a par with maps and reviews, so it is worth tracking what is posted about them. If payments in messages come to Europe, they will compete with IRIS and banks' apps for transfers between individuals. Banks need to think about how to keep their relationship with younger customers as everyday transactions move into social apps.

Read the original on TechCrunch

Related service: myDATA integrations

Related stories