Europe now represents 10% of total Renminbi payments in value worldwide and is leading adoption beyond Asian countries, with four European countries in the top 10, excluding China and Hong Kong, according to Swift. Overall, the RMB strengthened its position as the seventh most used global payments currency and accounted for 1.57% of global payments.
The merchant groups embroiled in a long-running legal battle over debit interchange fees have petitioned the U.S. Supreme Court to review the case on the grounds that the Federal Reserve improperly took into account certain costs incurred by card issuers when calculating debit interchange fee limits. However, the retailers have not challenged a separate rule governing the number of unaffiliated debit card networks that must be available for debit and prepaid card transactions, which is good news for card issuers because it gives much longed-for certainty around a challenging issue.
The Consumer Bankers Association is taking umbrage over what it says are vague allegations by the CFPB’s private education loan ombudsman regarding agreements colleges and universities have with financial institutions to provide financial products to students.
In the wake of a flood of interest in a regulatory framework for digital currency companies proposed by New York State’s Department of Financial Services, the DFS has doubled the length of the comment period to 90 days.
Domestic card schemes have traditionally partnered with MasterCard and/or Visa in an arrangement that leaves the domestic player handling the local transactions and their international partner facilitating and controlling the international business. Should banks work with both or just partner with one of the international schemes?
The available technologies that will make payments simpler, cheaper and seamless, and will therefore drive mobile payments, aren’t going away.
Digital gift cards bring depth, not disruption, to gift card product lines.
For banks and their third-party vendors, it’s crucial to have a solid contract. Or, at least it’s crucial if they want to avoid the ire of regulators and fines that could reach into the billions.
Gift card exchanges play a key role in connecting motivated shoppers with retailers and driving incremental sales, according to survey data from Blackhawk Network. Consumers say they’d like to see more retail locations add gift card exchanges.
Fraudsters are ingenious at finding cracks in the bulwark against prepaid card fraud, but industry cooperation can blunt their effect with strategic practices that are surprisingly easy to implement.
PayPal and Braintree, which is part of PayPal’s business unit, are rolling out the One Touch mobile payment solution, which will enable consumers to make purchases on their mobile devices from PayPal merchants with one touch of the screen, rather than entering user IDs, passwords and payment card information.
A group of merchant associations this week petitioned the U.S. Supreme Court to review a March decision by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia.
Users of Kenya’s popular M-Pesa P2P payments platform can send funds at lower costs now that telecom provider Safaricom has slashed transaction fees for most transfers by more than two-thirds.
Beijing-based e-commerce platform DHgate is integrating MasterCard’s MasterPass online payment service to simplify online purchasing for customers.
Global Payout Inc., an electronic payment and prepaid solutions provider, today announced plans to acquire Maxie Mobile LLC, a global mobile payments provider focused on the underserved.
European mPOS provider SumUp has landed a new investment of more than $10 million to expand operations, including propelling adoption of its recently launched chip and PIN card reader.
Details of Apple Inc.’s mobile wallet plans continue to trickle out, with the latest clue found in a patent filing that illustrates a QR code. Published late last month, the application describes a parental control system that would enable parents to control payment authorization on their children’s mobile devices.
The Payment Card Industry Security Standards Council has issued new guidance to help merchants ensure that third-party providers have implemented sufficient security measures to protect shoppers’ payment card data.
Spanish-language media company Univision has chosen payment technology supplier FIS to provide end-to-end prepaid services for the Paybefore Award-winning Univision MasterCard Prepaid Card.
Heartland Payment Systems has acquired Leaf, creator of an mPOS tablet, a deal the payments processor said demonstrates its commitment to providing resources and support for small- to medium-sized businesses.
Corporate payments provider Comdata Inc. has been acquired for $3.45 billion by FleetCor Technologies Inc., a global provider of fuel cards and other workforce payments.
Host card emulation (HCE) unlocks the potential for NFC to expand mobile payments by making them more convenient and consumer-friendly, but developers must proceed with caution because of various security risks HCE poses, according to a new white paper from the Smart Card Alliance.
More than 575 million payment cards in the U.S. will be equipped with EMV chip security technology by the end of 2015, according to the latest projections from an industry group managing EMV implementation.
Payza, an online payment processing and e-wallet services provider, announced that customers in 190 countries can now buy bitcoins from their Payza account and then transfer the digital currency into their Bitcoin wallets.
Electronic gifting is growing in India, where retailers have adopted e-gifting to drive sales and increase brand awareness.
By Loraine DeBonis, Editor-in-Chief Options are exploding for prepaid cardholders with swipe, no-cost and mobile reloads making it easier than ever to spin cash into digital gold. Turning cash into an electronic form of payment is undergoing a bit of a renewal. With mobile deposit, unprecedented partnerships, free options and new uses for reload networks—from […]
Letter writing among U.S. lawmakers has been fast and furious lately as they try to influence how the U.S. Department of Education handles new rules governing universities’ and colleges’ arrangements with financial service providers that deliver financial aid dollars.
There’s a new player in the mPOS arena—and it’s a heavyweight.
Financial institutions looking to attract and retain small business customers can do so by beefing up their digital banking services, according to a new white paper from Fiserv.
Online payment voucher provider paysafecard has launched a new prepaid MasterCard, giving customers of the Vienna-based company a way to pay for offline purchases, as well.
FinCEN is urging financial institutions to foster a culture of compliance with Bank Secrecy Act/Anti-Money Laundering (BSA/AML) rules and has issued an advisory explaining how basic principles can strengthen compliance within organizations.
It isn’t just complaints about prepaid card products that the CFPB is trawling for.
The U.S. Postal Service (USPS) on Aug. 11 posted a net loss of $2 billion for the quarter ended June 30, 2014, compared with a net loss of $740 million for the same period a year ago, increasing pressure on the beleaguered organization to find new sources of revenue.
MasterCard and First Data Corp. today announced a partnership to extend MasterCard’s inControl product for managing card spending to First Data’s customers in Asia Pacific, to enhance their growing use of payments cards for e-commerce purchases.
The CFPB is focusing on universities in the Big Ten Conference to see if these schools, some of the largest in the U.S., have appropriately disclosed their agreements with financial institutions regarding the financial products they offer their students. “Making these agreements available for all financial products shows schools’ and companies’ commitment to transparency, helping […]
PayPal Inc.’s recent rebranding of its Bill Me Later service is part of an effort to bring credit more to the forefront of its business and continue its expansion into offline payments, according to the company.
Rumors of Twitter’s imminent entry into e-commerce got more fuel last week, when some users of the company’s Android app noticed a new “Payment & Shipping” option.
Growth in the volume of debit and credit card purchases in the UK continues to outstrip the growth in value as consumers use their cards more frequently for lower value payments. A threefold increase in contactless payments was a factor in the trend.
MetaBank has been released from its Consent Order by the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC), according to an announcement by the bank’s parent company, Meta Financial Group.
Capitalizing on its recent high-profile moves in the mobile banking space, Cachet Financial Solutions netted nearly $6 million in its Initial Public Offering last month.
