There is India's UPI (launched in 2016), Singapore PayNow (Launched 2017) that works in a similar way. And they also work across each platform.. UPI users in India can transfer to Paynow users in Singapore and vice versa.
This used to be case before the M series. Now each year a new M processor gets released that are "cheaper" than the previous generation MAC - better processor, more RAM and more storage for similar price than last year model.
This impacted their price in used market.
Increased usage of Sodium batteries for static applications (home storage) could reduce demand for Li based batteries. This could reduce the cost of Laptop batteries.
The SMS option is mainly to avoid requiring a smartphone. There is a huge population that do not have a smartphone.