Dive Brief:

• Amazon said it’s rolling out a new digital wallet service for the “sellers” that offer goods and services on its digital marketplace. The retail giant said in an online post that the new wallet service will bring sellers a convenient way to hold proceeds from their sales or transfer it to their bank accounts.
• The new service is free, other than currency conversion and international transfer fees when money is passed between countries, the July 25 Amazon post said.
• “Over the next few months, Amazon will roll out a new tool called Amazon Seller Wallet to simplify the global Amazon selling experience,” the company said in the post. “This early stage solution gives sellers an easy, hassle-free way to hold, view, and transfer Amazon store proceeds directly to their bank account on their schedule.”

Dive Insight:

The new Amazon wallet service is currently available only to a select group of the company’s small business sellers, some of whom have been trying it in recent weeks, according to the post. Amazon Spokesperson Alyssa Bronikowski declined to say how many sellers or which ones are currently using the service.

Amazon’s new offering is an “optional tool designed to give selling partners more control over how much and when to convert their funds in order to help them grow their business operations globally,” Bronikowski said by email.

Fintechs and legacy payments companies alike have been racing to offer consumers a portfolio of financial services through smartphone apps. PayPal, Square parent Block and Google are among the companies that are competing to draw users to their Swiss army knife of financial tools like digital wallets.

Seattle-based Amazon already has been providing its sellers with other payments and financing tools, including business loans; American Express and Visa credit cards, with loyalty program rewards; and currency converter options for sending money worldwide.

A Canadian seller quoted in Amazon’s wallet announcement said that he had been using the new service for “the past few weeks” so apparently it isn’t brand new this week. Bronikowski declined to say exactly when it started.

Separately, the online retailer also accepts digital wallet payments from consumers, including Apple Pay, Mastercard’s Masterpass and Visa Checkout, the company says on its site.