Technology

Digital currency, especially Bitcoin, picked up in popularity this year as the concept began garnering positive attention from payment players — but a series of negative incidents kept the skepticism alive as well.

Total System Services has completed its purchase of ProPay.

The payments industry is no stranger to fraud, but there are some key events that stand out over the course of 2012 — and threaten to spill into 2013.

Mortgages performed better in the third quarter than a year ago but quality has tapered off since the second quarter, the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency said.

D'mai Urban Spa in Brooklyn, N.Y. loves rainy days because it sees more customers when the weather is dreary. The Park Slope shop gleaned the information from Swipely's technology, which collects data on every customer that swipes a card in the spa.

McDonald's is adding more tap-and-go acceptance at its payment terminals worldwide.

Google’s mobile wallet appears to be staggering to the finish line of 2012. After all, it was a year that started with a reported security breach and is ending with speculation that the search-engine giant will add a plastic card to the otherwise entirely digital wallet.

It's been a rocky year for digital currencies. Facebook began phasing out its Facebook Credits while Bitcoin continues to suffer a bad reputation. However, there are some promising developments on the horizon, with experienced payments providers joining in the digital currency game.

The Google Wallet we see today is a much different product from what we had a year ago. Here are the major changes that took place this year, and the challenges Google faced — and still faces today.

JPMorgan Chase's recent deal to buy the merchant-offer provider Bloomspot Inc. will expand the ways in which the largest U.S. bank by assets presents offers to customers.