Jan. 31, 2013 Money transfer and global financial services provider Western Union Co. has expanded its Receive remittance card to Costa Rica and Guatemala. Initially launched in El Salvador last June, Receive enables recipients of Western Union money transfers to put all or part of the transferred funds onto a MasterCard-branded prepaid card. The company […]
Jan. 31, 2013 Social media giant Facebook Inc. closed out its first calendar year as a public company with $1.59 billion in fourth-quarter revenue, up 40 percent from $1.13 billion in 2011’s fourth quarter, with the improvement spurred mainly by a surge in mobile ad revenue. The proportion of Facebook’s advertising revenue from mobile devices […]
Jan. 30, 2013 State unemployment recipients who receive their benefits on prepaid cards are saving millions due to lower fees and improved services, according to a new report by the National Consumer Law Center (NCLC). The results of the agency’s 2013 Survey of Unemployment Prepaid Cards were an improvement over the NCLC’s 2011 study, which […]
Jan. 30, 2013 Citigroup Inc. and Visa Inc. are joining forces in the Philippines to launch the new Pag-IBIG Citi Prepaid Card, which could reach as many as 13 million Filipinos through its link to the nation’s social security program. The reloadable Visa card is available to all citizens who belong to the Philippine government’s […]
Jan. 30, 2013 Merchants across the U.S. are holding off on introducing a surcharge for Visa and MasterCard credit card transactions despite getting the green light to do so this week under the terms of a proposed settlement in the merchants’ antitrust case reached last November. The settlement, subject to final approval in a hearing […]
Jan. 30, 2013 GiftYa LLC, a mobile and digital gift credit platform and spinoff company of parent GiftCards.com LLC, has received $1 million of seed capital to develop the GiftYa platform. The $1 million investment comes from Jason Wolfe, founder of GiftCards.com and CEO of Wolfe LLC. GiftYa, which will be available online and as […]
Jan. 30, 2013 SALT Technology Inc., a San Francisco-based provider of a cloud-based mobile payments platform, has raised $2 million in financing from private investors with backgrounds in the mobile, financial and payments technology sectors. The company, which also has offices in London and Toronto, said it will use the new funding to accelerate the development […]
Dutch bank ABN Amro has hired 11 new specialist staff as it attempts to build out its business for high net worth individuals in Asia and the Middle East.
Software company Information Mosaic has released an improved version of its corporate actions tool, IMActions, which it says will help banks and CSDs prepare for T2S.
Citi has introduced a new kind of ATM designed to help customers do virtually all their banking without visiting a branch.
Flawed decisions taken by machines are causing financial services firms to lose customers and suffer unexpected costs, according to new report by the Economist Intelligence unit. Yet retail banks are increasingly turning to technology to assess customers.
Jan. 29, 2013 Mobile wallets are far from fully developed, but a handful are gaining an early edge on competitors based on ease of use and payment options, according to new analysis from Carlisle & Gallagher Consulting Group. The firm’s “Mobile Wallet Market Analysis” set out to analyze “apps for smartphones or tablets enabling consumers […]
Jan. 29, 2013 Software maker Intuit Inc. has acquired Facebook e-commerce platform Payvment, taking over the Palo Alto, Calif., company’s employees, technology and patents—but not its customers. In a note posted on its Website yesterday, Payvment announced that its team was “joining a new company” and that the platform—which enables retailers to create their own […]
Jan. 29, 2013 In a move POS terminal maker Ingenico said is part of its bid to become a “one-stop-shop” for multichannel payment solutions, the Paris-based company has entered a deal to acquire payment processor Ogone Partners for EUR360 million (US$485 million). Ingenico will incorporate Ogone’s 42,000-merchant online payments platform into its existing POS and […]
Jan. 29, 2013 Adding to a growing array of mobile payments options for merchants, FreedomPay is entering the fray with “Vibe,” a mobile wallet initially targeting restaurant operators interested in creating targeted consumer promotions on the fly, based on specials, weather and in-store traffic conditions. The Radnor, Pa.-based payment processor says its cloud-based mobile wallet […]
A new social media tool designed for banks and built by British technology firm Integritie aims to break through the barriers that separate customers from their bank.
UK banks are still in “a difficult place” as they face economic uncertainty, increased cost and competitive pressures, complex regulations and rapid technological changes – but the changes that are happening in the payments industry offer scope for them to reclaim the initiative and deploy innovative solutions.
Four out of five financial institutions are not ready for new regulations governing the trading, reporting and clearing of OTC derivatives, according to a new survey by US communications company IPC.
Jan. 28, 2013 Paybefore today announced winners for the 2013 Paybefore Awards—the most prestigious recognition of excellence in the worldwide prepaid and emerging payments industry. And for the first time in the seven-year history of the awards, Paybefore is allowing visitors to Paybefore.com (subscribers and nonsubscribers) to cast their votes for Best in Category through Feb. […]
The European Banking Authority has adopted a formal recommendation to push major EU cross-border banks into developing group recovery plans by the end of this year.
Peter Reitz, managing director of Eurex Repo and Eurex Bonds since 2006, has stepped down from the posts. He will continue to bear overall responsibility for the two subsidiaries on the Eurex Executive Board.
Jan. 25, 2013 Just a day after President Obama nominated CFPB Director Richard Cordray to continue in his role as the bureau’s director, a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit ruled that the President violated the Constitution when he bypassed the Senate to fill vacancies on the National Labor Relations Board, according to a […]
Total bank IT spending across North America, Europe, and Asia-Pacific will grow to $179.2 billion in 2013, an increase of 3.4% over last year according to research and consulting firm Celent.
Jan. 24, 2013 Wasting little time following his inauguration on Monday, President Barack Obama this afternoon has re-nominated Richard Cordray as director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB). The confirmation process for the former Ohio Attorney General could be rocky, considering Obama’s appointment of Cordray last year during a congressional recess. “There were no […]
Jan. 24, 2013 With U.S. financial institutions increasingly using social media to market to and interact with consumers, federal regulators have set their sights on establishing guidelines for consumer protection and compliance over such channels. The Federal Financial Institutions Examinations Council (FFIEC) has issued a notice of proposed guidance and request for comment from the […]
Jan. 24, 2013 The number of consumers using mobile devices to pay bills is slowly gaining momentum, according to Fiserv Inc., a Brookfield, Wis.-based provider of financial services technology, in its fifth annual Billing Household Survey, which assesses bill payment habits of active online households and infrequent or non-Internet users. Though the percentage of households […]
Jan. 24, 2012 Mobile carriers around the world continue to join forces to enable mobile payments. On Jan. 23, Taiwan’s Fair Trade Commission (FTC) approved an application by five domestic mobile carriers and transit card provider EasyCard Corp. to jointly run a platform for mobile payment-related apps, according to the Central News Agency. Chunghwa Telecom […]
Jan. 24, 2013 The rise of corporate mobile payments is leading to some big saving for companies around the globe that are seeing reductions of up to 20 percent on their cash-collection costs, according to a new white paper by Mobile Money Consulting, a London-based advisory firm. Corporations in emerging markets are seeing the highest […]
Jan. 24, 2013 Online search giant Google Inc. and payments processor TSYS recently released fourth-quarter financial results. Google reported revenues of $14.4 billion for the fourth quarter of 2012, an increase of 36 percent compared with $10.6 billion in the same quarter a year ago. Net income in the fourth quarter of 2012 grew 7.4 […]
Lloyds Banking Group is to cut 940 more jobs, the latest in a series of savage headcount culls at major financial institutions. Separate announcements earlier this week confirmed 200 human resources jobs would be axed, and a further 175 cuts made in the Halifax branch network.
CGI, which recently acquired UK software house Logica, has formed a partnership with mobile banking and payment specialist Monetise to offer joint services for banking and payments companies using the Monitise platform.
Too many brokers are still using outdated methods such as email and telephone to confirm trade matches, undermining the advantages gleaned from high-performance trading technology, according to a new study by financial research firm Aite Group.
Chilean broker Banchile, part of Santiago- based Banco de Chile, has deployed a brokerage platform from UK systems supplier Fidessa that will link it to international trading venues.
The latest bi-annual Fraud Barometer from KPMG has shown a rise in individuals committing more traditional swindles such as Ponzi schemes, cheque fraud and procurement fraud. The findings are in broad agreement with figures from CIFAS, the UK fraud monitoring service, published last week
Specialist financial outsourcing company HML has hired Nigel Turner as its new chief commercial officer.
Post-trade software company Information Mosaic has appointed Ulrich Kunz as non-executive chairman to help drive its ambitions to expand into analytics.
Jan. 22, 2013 Google Inc. is adding digital muscle to coupons with Zavers by Google, a paperless couponing system introduced earlier this month that enables consumers to capture coupons online and redeem them automatically through store loyalty cards, tracking their deals through a computer browser or any mobile phone. The system is designed to give […]
Jan. 22, 2013 Munich-based Telefónica Deutschland in mid-February plans to enable P2P funds transfers between its mobile phone service subscribers along with a new NFC pilot that will launch at the same time in Germany. The effort grew out of the mpass mobile wallet service, announced last year as a joint venture between Telefónica Germany, […]
Jan. 22, 2013 Cash transaction network PayNearMe is taking its payment services small-time in a move the company thinks will pay off in a big way. The Sunnyvale, Calif.-based firm, founded in 2009 and led by CEO Danny Shader, has launched PayNearMe Express, a self-service version of its existing cash payment system, aimed at enabling […]
Jan. 22, 2013 Prepaid card provider Synchology is targeting a decidedly “banked” demographic with its new card offering, betting that attractive features and a simple pricing model can attract mainstream customers as an alternative to traditional bank accounts. The Jump Visa Prepaid Card offers cardholders rewards, money management and budgeting tools, free customer support and […]
