On Feb. 8, Hyundai Card and Apple announced that they will introduce Apple Pay to Korea. Korea's mobile payment market is expected to undergo a major change.
 South Korea's Financial Supervisory Service announced on Feb. 3 that it is possible to introduce Apple Pay according to related procedures after reviewing whether Apple Pay services counter to local regulations and laws. As a result, experts expect that Apple Pay could be released in the first half of the year.
 According to business.com, mobile payment shares in the United States were in the order of Apple Pay, Google Pay, and Samsung Pay. On the contrary, Samsung Pay currently monopolizes the Korean mobile payment market. The reason is that Korea is one of few countries in the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) where Apple Pay has not been introduced. However, Apple Pay is now set to be launched in Korea, and intense competition with Samsung Pay is expected.
 Accordingly, it is expected that there will be many difficulties before Apple Pay is popularized. Although Hyundai Card has given up its exclusive rights with Apple Pay, it will take a long time for other card companies to negotiate with Apple and prepare for the service. Also, expanding the distribution of Near Field Communication (NFC) terminals is key. Unlike Samsung Pay's support for both Magnetic Secure Transmission (MST) and NFC, Apple Pay only supports NFC. MST is a method of transmitting payment information through magnetic cards, and most stores in Korea are using terminals for MST. On the other hand, NFC requires a terminal equipped with a separate receiver. According to a report by the Hana Institute of Finance, only about 10% of Korean credit card merchants currently have NFC-based terminals, so it is expected that there will be many inconveniences in using Apple Pay during the early stages of its introduction.
 Meanwhile, fluctuations in the mobile payment market are not expected to affect mobile phone market shares. Counterpoint Research analyzed that Apple Pay may draw a lot of attention from the market in the early stages of Apple Pay's introduction, but few people will actually change their devices due to Apple Pay.