Fintech

Groupon's new payments system is a small step toward a dramatic change in merchant acquiring, one that leaves ownership of consumer data up for grabs.

These days it seems like everyone is a payments company, whether their primary business is selling coffee or coupons. Wherever they come from, they're challenging the very structure of this industry.

Aiming to prompt smartphone-toting customers to communicate more than "withdraw $60" while they're frequenting ATMs, banks are playing up their social properties at their physical footprints.

ST. LOUIS – St. Louis Community CU has reached agreement with Central Bank of Kansas City engineered by the local chapter of the NAACP to buy the former Gateway Bank branch, which was the first and only minority-owned-and-managed financial institution in St. Louis for many years.

The payments industry has taken it upon itself to police any entity that accepts credit or debit cards — even when that entity is the police.

SAN JOSE, Calif. – Technology CU announced this evening that members overwhelmingly voted down a proposal to convert the $1.6 billion credit union to a mutual savings bank, which would have been the biggest credit union conversion ever.

Several merchant groups are asking members of Congress to hear their opposition to the swipe-fee settlement announced in July.

In an examination of 3.4 million four-digit passwords, the tech consultancy DataGenetics determined that users choose the PIN "1234" nearly 11% of the time.

BillMyParents, which provides a prepaid debit card with parental controls, announced a partnership with Autism Speaks, an autism science and advocacy organization.

The operators of a Philadelphia-based telemarketing scheme will pay more than $7.5 million to settle FTC charges that they peddled bogus credit cards and illegally debited consumers’ bank accounts.