Amazon

Unattended retail, which traditionally meant vending machines, laundromats and very small mini-stores, is benefiting from the same trends that make Amazon's cashierless stores possible. But is there room in the market for both models?

Policymakers need to update banking regulations to minimize the risks posed by technology companies entering financial services, a well-known policy analyst says in a new paper.

Global politics are dividing the world of e-commerce, forcing companies to make tough decisions about their strategies for the U.S., India and other regions.

Among the lessons David Hijirida learned at the online giant: Companies are often so focused on competitors that they neglect their own customers.

Thanks to big tech companies, the business world is moving to third-party platforms, or online marketplaces where buyers pull sellers' products off digital shelves. A growing number of financial institutions — including BBVA, Citi and community banks like Eastern — say they can't afford to sit out the trend.

Retailers are aggressively competing to bring new delivery technologies to market, ranging from autonomous vehicles to gig economy apps.

CEOs on the hot seat. Banks fighting to stay independent. Comfortable players ripe for disruption from Amazon and others. It is shaping up as a riveting year.

Readers this year responded to Mick Mulvaney's leadership at the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, the banking industry's role in the national gun debate, Rep. Maxine Waters' upcoming leadership of the Financial Services Committee, the influence of tech companies like Facebook and Amazon on financial services and much more.

India has tightened rules regarding how foreign e-commerce platforms are allowed to sell goods in one of the fastest growing online markets, a potential blow to companies like Amazon.com Inc. and Walmart Inc.’s Flipkart.

The tech giants, along with Apple, PayPal and others, are calling on the Federal Reserve to build a backbone for real-time payments, rejecting large banks’ claims that the task is best left to the private sector.

Instacart will begin separating itself from Whole Foods and eventually no longer let its customers order from the Amazon-owned grocer through its app or website,

Amazon and Shopify will likely improve and expand the “last mile” for e-commerce orders, putting the heat on UPS and FedEx, according to Radu Spineanu, co-founder and CEO of Two Tap.

Everything from fintechs to Amazon are threatening the financial services industry. Credit unions need a plan in place to keep up.

Airports would provide a way to bring Amazon Go to spaces beyond the relatively small storefronts at Go’s early locations in Seattle, San Francisco, Chicago and New York.

Credit unions could see a host of new growth opportunities from the online retailer's new headquarters, but concerns remain surrounding housing prices and infrastructure.

A shopping experience so easy that you feel like you’re shoplifting may be appealing, but it also raises privacy concerns, writes Peter Zaborszky, founder of BestVPN.com

Even as Amazon has expanded its cashierless Amazon Go stores to new cities, it has been careful to limit the size of each store as a concession to the limits of its technology. That constraint may soon be a thing of the past.

Any future machine-to-machine environment calling for communication and transactions will surely include a consumer's option to make payments through such a network. That turns any home or business into its own complex network of devices, routers, sensors, passwords, communication coding and private credentials.

On five days starting with Thanksgiving and continuing through Cyber Monday customers purchased millions more products compared to the same period last year.

As the economy softens, traditional banks have an opportunity to win back market share from fintech competitors.