Kate Fitzgerald

Big companies like Stripe and Visa have written off the idea of bitcoin being used for payments, citing the cryptocurrency’s inconsistent fees and speed — but Coinbase may be uniquely positioned to succeed where others were forced to give up.

Payworks has raised $14.5 million in a Series B funding round with several participants including Visa and CommerzVentures.

Tipalti, whose platform automates domestic and international accounts payable, has raised $30 million in a Series C financing round led by Zeev Ventures, bringing its funding total to $50 million.

Payfone, which provides technology to confirm customer identities, has secured $23 million in a funding round led in part by Synchrony Financial.

Wirecard has gained a foothold in using virtual prepaid cards to streamline corporate payments across business units, platforms and borders for companies with sprawling operations. Now the German company wants to do the same for more U.S. companies going global.

Apple Inc. stores in China now welcome Alipay, marking the first time the Cupertino, Calif.-based tech giant has officially accepted a third-party wallet at any of its brick-and-mortar stores worldwide.

Plenty of U.S. banks already have their own robust API programs, but research by Nacha, the electronic payments association, indicates that the differences in their approaches could slow the banks' ability to synchronize with global fintech development.

In the rising tide of e-commerce fraud, one of the trickiest areas to control is so-called friendly fraud, particularly within the growing markets for digital goods.

Walmart is the first major merchant to add Fiserv’s Accel signature debit service following the debit network’s recent expansion of routing options, in a move to cut costs for card acceptance.

Urban FT has acquired Digiliti, a troubled developer of mobile banking app technology, and will integrate its services into its white-label banking platform.

A group of tourists visiting Finland from China recently concluded a completely cashless trip sponsored by Alipay, which is claiming Finland is the first country where Chinese visitors can manage and pay for all aspects of travel solely using its mobile wallet.

The bank's commitment in the last couple of years to an "agile" environment of rapid testing and learning produced answers within a couple of months.

Sometimes an idea is ahead of its time. Many of the most ambitious products in fintech were dismissed as absurd or overambitious at the time — only to feel perfectly normal years later as culture and consumer habits evolved.

Mastercard knows the more time consumers spend on their mobile devices—often deliberately blocking ads—the less likely they are to see its iconic “Priceless” ads, even if those ads support a charitable cause.

Handle Financial’s online bill-payment service Prism has turned on a new feature enabling consumers to pay bills in real time from any of 11,000 U.S. billers via credit or debit cards, even when those options aren’t directly supported by the biller.

Despite millions spent on promotions and marketing for Apple Pay and other proprietary options from banks, mobile payments volume is still weak.

About a decade after its launch, Cambodia-based mobile money provider Wing has added a virtual prepaid Mastercard to its platform, enabling its audience of unbanked and underbanked consumers to shop online.

Wirecard is working with Fortress GB on new payments technology that will enable fans of two U.K.-based football clubs to earn points and cash-back rewards when making purchases inside stadiums at sporting events — and will track their spending data to decide on future offers.

MoviePass has pulled its participation from 10 AMC movie theaters following disagreement over the theaters’ support of MoviePass’ $9.95 monthly movie subscription model, which uses a Mastercard to guarantee payment through its app.

Sometimes an idea is ahead of its time. Many of the most ambitious products in payments and fintech were dismissed as absurd or over-ambitious at the time — only to feel perfectly normal years later as culture and consumer habits evolved.