John Adams

"Women have not reached the most senior levels as much as they should. This isn't specific to our industry; it's prevalent across the corporate world. It's difficult to pinpoint why – rather, it's likely a host of reasons."

"Whether you are a male or female, the most important thing is to always look at creating opportunities for yourself. You cannot wait for someone to think of you."

"At SVB, we consider disruption our friend. Disruptive innovation in payments has historically been more incremental compared to other sectors. But this sector is evolving…and fast."

"The time that we're in right now very much resembles, to me, the time that the Internet was exploding … there's so much going on."

"Many of our clients are women, too, and there's a significant opportunity for females to change the face of this business. I took a hell of a risk when I left the security of a banking job to come to First Data…and I couldn't be happier."

"The differentiating factors in ensuring women get the roles — and recognition — they deserve are the ability to drive change, think innovatively and build consensus. These, combined with the so-called 'soft' skills commonly associated with women, create a clear roadmap for the future of our industry and will allow women to leave a legacy of inspiration."

"Without a doubt, EMV, security and mobility are going to dominate the payments space this year."

The retail services market is flooded with Web-based developer tools that allow small businesses with little tech expertise to develop payment capabilities. But to companies like vCita, these toolkits are still too hard to use.

Mobile technology has enabled financial services in a number of African countries, and MasterCard is working to expand this model by tying it directly to a national identity program in Egypt.

MasterCard and Visa are using Samsung's mobile wallet to further the adoption of tokenization and other security methods at the point of sale, but safety concerns still cast a shadow on mobile payments and commerce.

Samsung Pay's ability to allow mobile payments while mimicking plastic card transactions will make it harder for rivals and merchants to strike back by disabling NFC at the point of sale when the system debuts later this year.

CO-OP Financial Services has vastly expanded its real time person to person payments reach, adding a credit union-led alternative to the faster payment models being pursued by banks.

Visa has agreed to buy marketing and payments company TrialPay as part of the card network's broader strategy to improve merchant relationships.

Pamela Joseph, U.S. Bancorp's vice chair of payment services and a 10-year veteran of the Minneapolis-based bank, plans to retire in mid-2015.

Pamela Joseph, U.S. Bancorp's vice chair of payment services and a ten-year veteran of the Minneapolis-based bank, plans to retire in mid-2015.

Apple Pay has begun its foray into airlines, deploying about 3,500 iPad minis that can accept mobile payments, but it is making a slow approach to the industry.

Google plans to release a new set of Android-based payment developer tools at its I/O conference in May, according to a report by the tech news site Ars Technica.

Brazil's embrace of digital commerce is providing juice for Santander's university smart-card program, which is growing by leaps and bounds as it lays the groundwork for the mobile channel.

First Data is releasing new services that stem from a strategic shift that followed the company's restructuring over the past year.

Home meal-prep delivery company PeachDish is working with Bitcoin processor BitPay to enable payments in the virtual currency.