PayThink

The article ‘Postal Banking Is a “Great Idea’: Bernie Sanders’ published Oct. 21 online by Credit Union Journal is yet another example of efforts by elected officials in Washington to have government encroach upon the activities of private enterprise.

Recent industry’s analysis of the credit market is too good to be believed or sustained, which should raise red flags for everyone.

Last week U.S. House Small Business Committee held the second part of a hearing entitled “The EMV Deadline and What it Means for Small Businesses,” which was supposed to address payment security in the United States.

With multiple points of contact and a boatload of documentation requirements for every loan application, anything credit unions can do to make this process for seamless — and less painful — for members is vital.

With the EMV liability shift having just passed, banks and merchants alike are scrambling to comply with the card network-imposed deadline.

Target, by all accounts, the corporate face of retail data breach, is driving full force to use its complete embrace of EMV to bolster its tarnished image and put it in the vanguard of card fraud protection and data security. And it is targeting one of the biggest sticking points to EMV: user adoption.

Great news: Women snagged a handful of C-level titles at big companies this week, including Ellen Alemany, Kim Hammonds and Heather Cox, and Square stands out in Silicon Valley with a leadership team that's 60% women. Bad news: the gender pay gap is growing and there are only two women among Harvard's picks for the top 100 CEOs globally. Also in the news: Blackrock's Cheryl Mills, B of A's Cathy Bessant and ICICI's Chanda Kochhar.

Industry representatives are howling about the lack of consumer benefit from the Durbin amendment, but we still know very little about the impact of the debit fee cap.

The industry will undoubtedly get bad press in an election cycle, but here is what institutions should do and not do about it.

Independent sales organizations and sales agents are finding that offering merchant cash advances and small-business loans can provide a lucrative sideline. But as with any enterprise, entrepreneurs who are focusing on the upside of the business should also develop a keen understanding of the pitfalls that can accompany a foray into alternative finance.