John Adams

Former VeriFone CEO Douglas Bergeron has partnered with private equity shop GTCR to form Opus Global Holdings, a company that will pursue acquisitions in the financial technology and payments sector.

Nacha, the electronic payments association, is advocating security as a reason to adopt faster processing — a move that would require a change in the association's rules that has thus far proven elusive.

Payment terminal maker VeriFone has appointed Paul Galant, previously a Citigroup payments executive, to be its chief executive officer and a member of its board of directors, effective Oct 1.

Mobile wallets are as much a threat as an opportunity to the credit union community. In an effort to fight back, One Nevada Credit Union is working with several experts on CU Wallet, a credit union-focused mobile payments system.

MasterCard and e-invoicing provider Basware will offer an electronic payments system designed to speed payments and approvals for suppliers and extend payment terms for buyers.

For credit unions, mobile wallets are as much a threat as an opportunity. In an effort to fight back, One Nevada Credit Union is working with several experts on CU Wallet, a credit union-focused mobile payments system.

A substantial majority of payments in the U.S. and Canada are non-cash, placing the two countries close to being cashless, MasterCard reported Sept. 23.

Payment processing software company ACI Worldwide has entered an agreement to buy Official Payments Holdings, a seller of electronic bill payment technology.

Richard Lyon is the new commercial director for Northern Europe at Spire Payments, a payments technology company.

PayPal is nearing a deal to buy Braintree Payment Solutions, which would give the eBay subsidiary access to transaction fees from more than $10 billion in payments Braintree processes annually, according to a report in the Wall Street Journal.

In a very short time, Florence Savings Bank has seen its customers demonstrate a fanatical devotion to its new instant debit card issuance system.

MasterCard is actively building payments capabilities for Google Glass, Google's wearable computing device.

Panini has promoted Michael Pratt to CEO, replacing John O'Malley, who has left to pursue other interests, the Torino, Italy-based financial technology company announced Sept. 20.

Vantiv plans to release a suite of services next week to target different parts of the casino industry.

MoneyGram has purchased Advanced ChronoCash Services (ACCS) and signed an agreement to acquire MoneyGlobe Payment Institution, both Athens, Greece-based money transfer companies.

The Bitcoin Foundation, a trade group, is urging the Federal Election Commission (FEC) to allow bitcoins to be used for federal political contributions.

San Francisco-area transit operators are launching a mobile website to manage the Clipper fare cards.

MasterCard and Entrepreneurial Finance Lab (EFL) are offering a reputation-based scoring system to improve credit underwriting for unbanked small businesses, a move designed to increase non-cash payments in developing countries.

Southwestern Advantage, a multi-level marketing company with a model similar to Avon or Amway, relies on college students to sell its educational materials — raising potential risk issues as a young and inexperienced sales force is tasked with protecting payment details.

Payments marketing company edo has launched edo Marketplace, a card-linked offers platform that allows merchants to create their own targeted campaigns.