Merchant

Hypercom Corp., which is being acquired by VeriFone Systems Inc., said in a regulatory filing Feb. 14 that the combined companies should generate nearly $2 billion in revenue next year.

Better-than-expected merchant reaction to Intuit Inc.’s offer of free card readers and no monthly service fees to small merchants using its GoPayment mobile-payments service has prompted the company to extend the offer indefinitely, the Mountain View, Calif.-based company announced Feb. 16.

As many as 1,000 credit union members around Maine are believed to have had their card accounts compromised and are now reporting unauthorized transactions on their accounts.

Hypercom Corp.’s stock rose slightly in morning trading Feb. 16 after the payment-terminal maker reported preliminary fourth-quarter net revenue of $140 million, up 19% from a year earlier.

Portfolio Recovery Associates Inc. posted record fourth-quarter revenue while profits soared nearly 70% from a year earlier, the debt buyer and collection agency announced Tuesday.

Deborah McWhinney, the head of Citigroup's flagging personal banking and wealth management group, is leaving her post after a tumultuous two-year run in which she attempted to makeover the nation's third-largest bank following the spin-off of its Smith Barney brokerage unit in 2009.

MasterCard Worldwide plans to bring payment security to U.S. consumers through passcode-generating display cards, the card brand announced Feb. 14 at the RSA Conference in San Francisco.

Visa Inc. has joined forces with Starbucks Corp. in what may be one of the emerging mobile-payment industry’s first national promotions designed to improve a payment brand’s status within a mobile wallet.

VeriFone Systems Inc. has turned its PayWare Mobile point-of-sale service into the equivalent of a multipurpose Swiss Army knife for payment acceptance, a necessary step to introduce the device to a global audience, according to the San Jose, Calif.-based payment-terminal maker.

Long satisfied with offering merchants a purpose-built wireless point-of-sale terminal, Matt Freedman, chief operating officer at Total Merchant Services Inc., realized last year his independent sales organization needed to offer more to meet the needs of a broader mobile-merchant audience.