Each week, Industry Focus: Financials host Jason Moser and Fool.com contributor Matt Frankel, CFP, each discuss one of the stocks they're keeping an eye on. Jason has PayPal (PYPL 0.94%) toward the top of his watch list, while on a related note, Matt is keeping an eye on Facebook (FB 1.46%) after PayPal decided to bail out of Facebook's Libra cryptocurrency initiative.
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This video was recorded on Oct. 7, 2019.
Jason Moser: OK, Matt, we're going to wrap the week up as always here with One to Watch. What is your One to Watch for our listeners this week?
Matt Frankel: Continuing our discussion about Libra, I'm keeping an eye on Facebook. I want to see how they react to PayPal jumping out, if any. I want to see if Visa and Mastercard do end up jumping out. And I think if you see a bunch more jumping out, they're going to toss the project out, or at least put the brakes on it. I think if they put the brakes on the project, Facebook's stock goes up. I think if you see all these partners jumping out and Facebook decides to push on with it, the stock might take a hit because of it.
Moser: Yeah, I could see that. You almost look at it and think, "Man, guys, take a hint. Don't waste any more time or money on it." I guess we'll see. I'm going to go in tandem with you here. I'm not looking at Facebook, but I'm looking at PayPal, ticker PYPL. This is a bit beyond the Libra news. Other than the Libra news, some of you may have seen last week, maybe the week before, news that PayPal, via a 70% interest, purchased in Chinese payments company GoPay. Now gives PayPal license to provide online payment services in China. If you are wondering if that's a big deal, we're talking about a market opportunity that by 2023 is projected to be around $96.73 trillion. Listen, that's a big market opportunity. I don't know that necessarily all applies to PayPal. But ultimately, we're talking about money that flows through these networks. That's PayPal's opportunity. If you're talking about a country the size of China, you're talking about a lot of money flowing through a big network. PayPal getting entry into that market, that was the hardest part. Now it's going to be just about building out products and services for more people.
You may wonder, why PayPal? Perhaps they're just seen as the best option in a tech-driven payments world. I'm not sure. We obviously like it for a lot of reasons. It's a company that was built on the technology as opposed to one that's pivoting toward technology. And then, you can't forget about the big cross-border opportunity. We've seen MasterCard and Visa both investing heavily in that opportunity. I think this is going to be a great long-term opportunity for PayPal. I was excited to see that news. How about you, Matt?
Frankel: Yeah, definitely. I am a big fan of PayPal, as you know. That's another one that I'm thinking about buying. When we were talking about recent stocks we bought, I haven't pulled the trigger yet, but that's one that I'm thinking about finally getting back into.
Moser: Alright, we'll let you shut up about it so you can at least take advantage of it if the opportunity arises.
