Australia's largest bank finally caves, announces imminent Apple Pay support

The Commonwealth Bank of Australia on Thursday announced it will finally begin supporting Apple Pay starting in January 2019.

CommBank is the second of the four major banks in Australia to adopt Apple's mobile payments platform after a contentious negotiation period kept the service out of the country for months.

The announcement was made today via CommBank's Twitter account.

Australia and New Zealand Banking Group currently supports Apple Pay, while National Australia Bank and Westpac have not revealed plans for adoption.

There has been much back and forth between Apple and Australia's banks, with the institutions at one point demanding direct access to iPhone's NFC chip to create their own authentication protocol. As part of struggle, Australia's "big-three" banks -- Commonwealth Bank of Australia, National Australia Bank and Westpac Banking Corp --

sought to collectively negotiate for the installation of non-Apple Pay software on iPhone hardware, threatening a boycott.

The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission denied the request in a draft determination in 2016, then again in a final determination in 2017, prompting the banks to reconsider their position on the matter.