By linking mobile payments with money transfers, Western Union created a new use for Apple's mobile wallet. But it must still rigidly conform to the basic requirements of an Apple Pay transaction — without a bank account, there is no payment.

Apple's mobile wallet has been out for just four months, and already it has shaken up the way mobile payments operate at the point of sale. It has faced pushback from some merchants and banks, but it has also popularized new forms of security and other payment technology.

While Visa and MasterCard aren't yet applying the same level of pressure for tokenization security as they are for EMV-chip cards, the card networks' CEOs are clear that this technology is their new expectation for e-commerce.

MyECheck has reached an agreement to buy the electronic payment software platform developer Seergate.

Several wallet apps already let restaurant patrons order ahead for takeout and/or pay without waiting for a waiter. A Ukrainian company called Settle takes this concept a step further by also allowing customers to skip the wait for a table.

Google reports a dramatic increase in mobile shopping, suggesting the channel is now mainstream for consumers.

The telco-backed mobile wallet Softcard is at a significant crossroads. Though it once saw the debut of Apple Pay as an opportunity, Apple may actually be edging its rivals out of the market, and Softcard's next move will decide not only its own fate but also the strategies of the banks and merchants that could benefit from its technology.

Visa Europe Ltd.'s full-year profit increased 30% on sharp growth of Internet payments across the continent.

The introduction of Apple Pay has also thrust Near Field Communication-based contactless payment technology out of the wings and into the spotlight.

Mangopay, a white-label payment solution provider for marketplaces, has opened an office at Level 39, London's largest technology accelerator.

Apple Pay's Touch ID is the exception, not the rule. Biometric security typically requires some type of add-on hardware, a model that has struggled to get much adoption over the years.

A lot of companies are lining up to provide payment pages for e-commerce merchants, and BlueSnap is working to set its own offering apart by adding design options for checkout.

Among the many obstacles for mobile payments, the most daunting is getting shoppers to change behavior. The fact is that plastic cards have worked quite well for a very long time and consumers are quite used to them. To get consumers to change decades-old habits is far from easy.

E-commerce retailers generally target the 80 million millennial shoppers because they are more likely to buy things online and spend more money online than other demographics.

Apple Pay has secured a dominant position at the point of sale, with two thirds of all U.S. contactless payment volume coming through Apple's new mobile wallet, according to Apple CEO Tim Cook. But this may not be the boost to mobile payments that many experts have long predicted.

Mobile payment and commerce provider Mozido LLC is bringing on a former MasterCard executive as its president for global markets.

Western Union is adopting a vastly different use of Apple Pay than what banks and merchants have so far considered.

The Federal Reserve System threw its weight behind a host of standards, goals and timelines yesterday that are likely to shape the quest to build a faster U.S. payment system.

Amazon.com's decision to quietly shut down its digital wallet app last week shows an uncharacteristic caution on the part of the e-commerce giant. Merchants throughout the Web use the company's e-commerce services, but the mobile and digital payments world is considerably more cutthroat.

Intuit will integrate payment technology from Stripe to automate tax reporting for self-employed workers in the version of its tax-filing software QuickBooks targeted towards them.