While not as large as the U.S. both in number of people and number of credit card owners, the U.K. remains a very lucrative market for issuing banks and card networks, as well as a host of alternative financial service providers catering to younger, underserved consumers.

Fears that the New York banking giant’s consumer lending product could cut into a key credit union market appear to have been overblown.

The New York bank said Wednesday that its first-ever credit card has brought in nearly $2 billion of loans in less than six months.

Mastercard is partnering with issuer processor EML and technology startup CleverCards to allow any business to send digital Mastercard payment cards directly to an employee’s or customer’s mobile wallet by SMS/text, email or any messaging app such as WhatsApp.

The banking giant is counting on continued growth in cards, deposits and digital accounts to drive returns higher in 2020.

The U.K. will stop gamblers from using credit cards to place bets as the government continues to tighten regulation of the industry.

The percentage of consumers who are past due on home equity loans, RV and other personal loans also rose in the third quarter, data released by the American Bankers Association showed.

U.K. credit card lender NewDay, which issues co-branded cards for Amazon, Laura Ashley and Topshop, is expanding its technology offerings by acquiring installment lending platform Deko.

A strong economy in 2020 could lift the small-business card market, which is an important source of lending and payments for entrepreneurs and local merchants.

Oklahoma lawmakers' decision last month to drop the state's surcharging ban was yet another signal that U.S. merchants have the final say in whether to apply extra charges to credit card transactions to offset interchange fees.