Michael Moeser

Vocalink, a Mastercard company, signed a contract with Peru’s automated clearinghouse, Cámara de Compensación Electrónica, to modernize the country’s payment infrastructure, including support for real-time payments at all times.

Mastercard and white label payment software company Cardstream are partnering to accelerate the deployment of Mastercard’s Secure Remote Commerce (SRC)-ready Masterpass wallet and its “Pay by Bank” solution.

Credit and debit cards often overshadow prepaid gift cards, but the tables get turned during holidays, particularly as people get gift cards for themselves.

Kleiner Perkins and Ribbit Capital led an $80 million funding round in Viva Republica, the South Korean maker of the popular P2P payment app Toss.

KKR, which has a substantial financial services portfolio, has made a $75 million equity investment in Cross River Bank, part of an overall $100 million capital raise. Cross River will use the funds to expand the technology and compliance infrastructure that it provides to fintech organizations.

Chase and UATP, the airline-owned payment network, are collaborating to make Chase Pay an option on airline websites and mobile apps.

The voice biometrics firm Pindrop closed on its Series D fund raising round with $90 million in new capital to fuel expansion in voice authentication and security services for call centers and internet of things devices. It also added a new CFO and CRO.

Chinese payment companies have successfully lured merchants outside of China by enabling payments for Chinese tourists, a use case Tencent hopes will work in Japan, where rival Alipay lurks.

As payment stakeholders show an interest in using fingerprint technology to improve identity protection, NEXT Biometrics and MK Group plan to collaborate on biometric smart cards for banking and other applications.

In the past few years the Chinese government has loosened restrictions on foreign travel, enabling millions of its citizenry to visit foreign lands. Along with a greater ability to travel is the enhanced prosperity Chinese consumers have reaped at home — and now bring with them on vacations to purchase foreign goods.

Standard Cognition raised $40 million in a Series A funding round among five different venture capitalists to expand its cashierless checkout footprint.

Now that states such as Michigan, Utah and Missouri voted in favor of legalization in this year's midterms, legal marijuana is poised to become a growth industry.

Cargo, a provider of in-car commerce systems to the ride-sharing market, is now accepting Venmo as a payment option to complete in-car transactions.

The Madrid-based personal financial management provider Fintonic has partnered with Amazon to offer its Spanish customers a zero percent installment loan for purchases made on Amazon.es.

In its 10th year promoting an unofficial Chinese holiday celebrating singlehood, Alibaba’s online sales hit a record $30.8 billion (RMB213.5), exceeding last year’s record by 27 percent.

PNC is piloting IDEMIA’s motion code card which offers a dynamic CVV2 security code for its commercial clients in an effort to combat card not present fraud.

Intesa Sanpaolo will be testing a new biometric contactless Mastercard in Italy, leveraging technology from Sweden-based Fingerprints AB.

As companies mature out of their startup phase, their sales growth curves begin to flatten and costs start to rise — unless, of course, they change their business model. And that’s exactly what Square is doing to maintain its startup-style growth.

During his time as U.S. attorney general, Jeff Sessions was an outspoken opponent of the legalization of cannabis sales. Now that Sessions has resigned, legal marijuana is poised to become a growth industry.

The Bank of England issued a challenge for consumers who usually pay with cash to go cashless for a week, as an educational experience prior to its upcoming conference, Future Forum 2018.