Facebook announces payment capabilities for Messenger service

Reuters
A man poses with a magnifier in front of a Facebook logo on display in this illustration taken in Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina, December 16, 2015. REUTERS/Dado Ruvic

San Francisco (Reuters) - Facebook's Messenger application, which now boasts a billion users, is introducing new capabilities that will make it possible to pay for goods and services through Messenger or though "bots," or automated programs, that use the messaging app. David Marcus, VP of messaging products at Facebook, said at the TechCrunch Disrupt conference that the company was working with a number of payment providers including PayPal, Visa, Mastercard, American Express and Stripe to implement the features. (Reporting by Jonathan Weber)