Walmart Becomes Klarna’s Biggest Retail Partner in Canada

Flexible payments firm Klarna has brought its payment solution to Walmart Canada.

The roll-out, announced Monday (Aug. 25), makes Walmart Canada and its 400-plus stores the largest retailer in that country to host Klarna’s flexible payment offerings.

“We’re always looking for innovative ways to enhance the shopping experience and provide more flexibility and convenience for our customers,” Joseph Godsey, chief growth officer at Walmart Canada, said in a news release.

“Introducing BNPL options, powered by Klarna, across our stores allows us to provide even more payment choice to the 1.5 million customers we have the opportunity to serve each day.”

According to the release, the partnership lets customers use Klarna’s buy now, pay later (BNPL) solution on the Walmart Canada website and mobile app, as well as in store via QR codes at assisted checkout lanes. This lets them choose between paying for their purchases in full or dividing them into four installments on purchases of more than $50 Canadian.

Klarna announced earlier this year that it had agreed to become Walmart’s exclusive provider of installment loans, an arrangement that also allows OnePay, the consumer finance platform backed by Walmart and Ribbit Capital, the ability to add installment loans to its product portfolio.

More recently, Klarna announced it had landed $26 billion in new funding thanks to a multi-year agreement with financial services and investment firm Nelnet. With this agreement Klarna will sell Nelnet up to $26 billion in receivables from its “Pay in 4” installment program.

Days later, the company said it had secured a warehouse financing facility with Santander that provides funding capacity of up to 1.4 billion euros (about $1.6 billion).

Meanwhile, recent research by PYMNTS Intelligence shows the prevalence of BNPL services like Klarna in consumers’ lives.

In fact, many consumers told PYMNTS they would either cancel a payment or purchase completely (43%) or go with a cheaper product or service (42.4%), if BNPL options were not available.

In addition, 35.1% of consumers reported that they would complete the payment but hold off on other due payments, highlighting the influence of BNPL on overall spending patterns.

The research also looked at the major players in the American BNPL space, finding Klarna commanding the largest estimated market share at 26.2%, followed by Afterpay, with an estimated 21.9% share, and Affirm, with a market share of 19.3%.