Technology

Retailers are worried about the online giant’s move into bricks-and-mortar retailing. For example, Amazon's $13.7 billion acquisition of Whole Foods Market Inc. wiped $17 billion off the value of Walmart.

U.S. private equity firm Hellman & Friedman LLC is among the companies to have shown interest in Nets, which is working with a financial adviser to review options after getting inbound interest.

Apple's plans to display a bright blue bar on iPhone screens when an application is monitoring the user's location may feel like a threat to location-based marketing. More likely, it is an overdue wake-up call for banks to improve their communication about the benefits of location data.

An influx of metal credit cards continues, with Capital One now encasing its popular Venture travel Visa card in metal, raising new questions about whether the marketing impact of such cards offsets their cost to manufacture—and reissue in the event of a data breach.

Led by Starbucks and Apple's mobile payment apps, there's a boom underway and retailers need to act fast to avoid being left behind.

Interviews with entrepreneurs and techies at the Copenhagen conference.

Though they face an array of competitive threats — from digital currencies to peer-to-peer payment apps — the vast majority of community banks do not have a payments strategy, according to a recent survey.

Apologies to those yearning for escapism, but it is hard to escape turmoil — in financial services, in the economy and in civilization — in this year’s reading list. That said, these weighty topics promise to stimulate the mind: How AI will disrupt employment; dystopian imaginings and real-life histories of societal shifts; the necessity of collaboration; bitcoin’s path from obscurity to relevance; the need for leaders to make sacrifices; and more. Recommendations are courtesy of American Banker readers, editorial staff and BankThink contributors.

With a new core system, Surety Bank plans to connect with customers outside of its geographic market.

Enabling peers to compare notes will help ID management specialists at regional, midtier banks who face the same requirements as large banks but command smaller operating budgets, IDPro’s founder says.