Cards

While consumer spending on Valentine’s Day doesn’t approach that of the larger holidays, certain retailers — such as jewelers and florists — benefit more than others, while restaurants, bars and other dining establishments tend to see significantly more traffic for those couples who want an evening out. Increasingly, it’s also a special day for pets.

While many public policy initiatives focus on the 1.7 billion “unbanked,” we rarely hear about the nearly 1 billion people who do have a bank account and a smartphone but have no credit card nor cross-border-enabled debit, writes Eric Rosenthal, managing director of the Americas at Rapyd.

The financial services industry has plenty of tasks, such as card issuance, that can benefit from the automation that artificial intelligence brings, writes Jie Wu, a director at GoodData.

The bank says it has restored access, but it hasn’t explained how a fire-suppression system at one facility could cause a nationwide outage across all of its channels, or how its system as a whole could have been left so vulnerable to the incident.

Customers reported being unable to access online banking, mobile banking or their debit cards.

Given the competitive nature of the current marketplace and the low probability that interchange rates will actually go up, issuers and processors need to continually evaluate their infrastructure, writes Steve Gilde, director of global product marketing for Paragon Application Systems.

Visa for years has used its sponsorship of the Super Bowl to promote contactless and mobile payments, but it hasn’t squeezed cash out of the event yet.

The New York based Petal uses machine learning to optimize the limited financial data available for low-information consumer groups and millennials, who often turn to installment loans from companies such as Affirm, Klarna and PayPal Credit.

All-in-one cards often fail, but the fintech's attempt to change that narrative includes a premium card with added benefits.

Florida’s Tropicana Field has eliminated cash from all concessions, ticket sales and parking, requiring Tampa Bay’s baseball fans to pay with credit, debit or gift cards at terminals that are also equipped with NFC for mobile and contactless payments.