Mobile payments

The simple act of moving money can have a big impact on any political movement, so banks and payment networks are often caught up in issues of national importance. Here are some recent instances where payments and politics came head-to-head.

China's Alipay already has broad global reach—its mobile wallet is accepted at more than 100,000 retail locations in 70 international markets—but in North America it’s just getting started.

The real lag behind fintech started when banks rested on those online and mobile banking laurels and allowed other players in the mobile space to bypass them in working toward mobile point of sale payment services, writes Jack Jania, senior vice president of strategic payment alliances at Gemalto.

Mastercard and Visa have also opened development centers in India, where digital payments are growing quickly.

The European directive is an opportunity for U.S. institutions to update data protection, writes Seth Ruden, senior fraud consultant for ACI Worldwide.

Both merchants and consumers still see the act of making a payment as a barrier and again look to technology to enhance the experience, writes Chris Koide, senior advisor and vice president of financial services for Bambora North America.

With this year's iPhone announcement getting closer, more rumors are spreading about how Apple plans to overhaul the way its phones handle payments. Some of these have already been confirmed by Apple; others are leaking in code the company has released.

Usernames, passwords, device authentication and even biometrics have vulnerabilities. Behavioral identity is much harder for crooks to crack, writes Robert Capps, a vice president at NuData Security.

For issuers, higher online and mobile conversion rates should translate to increased payment volume transacted on their cards, but it opens up a new avenue for intense jockeying over top of wallet status, writes Michael Jabbara, director of digital development markets for Visa.

Even as mobile payments at the point of sale have been slow or even faltering, as most research indicates, use of mobile for making large money transfers is climbing.