Cards

The U.S. Federal Reserve Board plans to get a better idea of how Americans are making payments — when they don’t use cash.

SmartyPig is hoping people will start saving in the same way they "like" or tweet about a product online — with a click or a tap. The Des Moines company, which provides an online savings account and a prepaid card, has created a Chrome plugin to help with specific savings goals.

Cash trapping is on the rise and in response, the ATM Industry Association has published a manual detailing emerging fraud trends and methods for ATM owners to combat the problem.

The concept of making anonymous online transactions is in the spotlight because of the prominence of the digital currency Bitcoin, but most consumers remain uneasy with the cryptocurrency's instability and risk. An alternative for the privacy-minded might sprout from Tor, or The Onion Router.

One week after American Express Co. announced that its fourth-quarter earnings fell sharply from a year earlier, the company filled in more details Thursday.

American Express Co., the lender that plans to cut 5,400 jobs this year, said profit at its U.S. card business declined 42 percent in the fourth quarter as the firm set aside more money to cover soured loans.

The Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard is all about money — but increasingly, the question is whether it's about protecting money or making money.

A week after it announced involvement in the first contactless payment program in Germany, French terminal maker Ingenico SA says it plans to do the same thing in Portugal.

PayPal has won repeated partnerships with large merchants for its new point of sale payment system, but it paced itself with consumer adoption — a strategy the eBay unit seeks to change in 2013.

The prepaid card provider SelectCore Ltd. announced the addition of an online bill payment offering.

Cardtronics announced the creation of a chief information security officer position that will be held by its current chief information officer, Jerry Garcia.

PayPal experienced its fastest active account growth rate in years during the fourth quarter, according to parent company eBay Inc. This growth of 15%, to 122.7 million active accounts, came in part from the company's activity in mobile commerce.

Research in Motion Ltd. received a significant stamp of approval for its software from Visa Inc. Visa has approved Waterloo, Ontario-based RiM's secure element manager software for Near Field Communication mobile payments.

Square has built its reputation as a quick and simple way for micro-merchants to accept card payments, but the company says it has proven it can serve the more demanding needs of larger retailers.

Payments acquirer WorldPay US is working with Discover Financial Services to allow merchants with brick-and-mortar stores to accept PayPal at the point of sale.

The mega-retailers' Merchant Customer Exchange venture argues that the mobile-payment system it is developing will appeal to retailers in a way no other mobile wallet can. That’s leaving some companies divided on which mobile approach is best—MCX's focus on gaining retailer acceptance or the emphasis on consumer adoption championed by Isis and others.

After months of internal testing, the prepaid card provider Green Dot is rolling out a beta version of its mobile consumer checking account, named GoBank.

PayPal Inc., pushing ahead with its drive to become the payment option of choice at the point of sale, has entered an agreement with hardware maker NCR Corp.

Jumio Inc. has released an Android version of its Netswipe Mobile technology for accepting card payments with a phone's camera.

"We're open to partnering and playing with the existing networks, but not under the existing rule base," says Jamie Henry, senior payment director of Wal-Mart Stores Inc. "The existing rules that are in place for card-based payments are not going to be acceptable for mobile-based payments."