Technology

American Express Canada is launching a digital payment solution that replaces plastic cards with virtual account numbers.

BM Corp., one of the bluest of U.S. blue-chip companies, is touting blockchain as the supply-management tool of choice for an unusual industry — cannabis.

USA Technologies, a provider of payments technology enabling card and mobile payments at vending machines in the U.S., is buying Cantaloupe Systems, which has its own line of vending machine payments solutions in the U.S. and other markets, for $85 million.

The companies' recently launched partnership furthers the argument that the banking and fintech industries might be better served working together rather than competing.

Messenger is one of Facebook's most requested services in the U.K. and France, making these markets ripe for the platform's new P-to-P payments capabilities. But in taking the service internationally, Facebook may also reveal its limitations.

A smart contract for advertising delivery and payments can be subjected to additional layers of verification and enforcement by optional service providers on the network, such as the measurement provider, ratings provider, payment provider and arbitrator, writes Charles Manning, founder and CEO of Kochava.

The fintech is partnering with Choice Financial in North Dakota to create a Douugh-branded checking account and debit card that will prominently feature an AI-based virtual assistant named Sophie.

Bill Donnelly was named the first-ever finance chief at San Francisco-based LendUp.

No matter what the new tool is, you can almost bet it will come with its share of disruption to the very people who invented it, writes Kim Curley, director of people and organizational change for NTT Data Services FSI Business Consulting.

Amid the rise of online lending earlier this decade, banks were derided as being too slow to adapt. But over time it's become clear that banks hold key advantages over lending startups.