Mobile payments

Ingenico Group has unveiled a new brand, Ingenico ePayments, as the latest step for the payment terminal maker in its evolution to becoming a provider of diversified global payment services.

First Data has unveiled Clover Go, a new EMV-enabled card reader for mobile devices and the latest device in its Clover mobile point of sale product line.

The Barclaycard app now will allow Near Field Communication-enabled contactless payments on supported Android devices.

Apple Pay's international expansion has been slow enough that other mobile wallet providers are working to get out in front in markets such as Latin America.

A year ago, a few trends were already clear to us, but many were just taking shape. Here's what we told you to expect from 2015, and how each of these predictions played out.

Cash remains the payment method of choice for nearly four out of five consumers needing to pay someone back, including the notoriously tech-savvy millennials.

Sometimes a big crash throttles the peloton and gives a few riders a chance to breakaway. In 2016, that is what we will see in the world of mobile payments. As EMV and Loyalty 1.0 eat the pavement, they will enable mobile payments, Loyalty 2.0 and new Uber-style apps to separate from the pack.

Apple Pay made a big splash when it arrived in late 2014, but has made few ripples since then, as consumers stuck to their old payment habits and banks in international markets proved reluctant to provide their support.

Through a partnership with Intel, terminal maker Ingenico Group has developed a contactless payment technology that is being used in a Panasonic tablet.

The majority of consumers, or about 70%, still rely exclusively on banks for their financial services, but that figure will likely slip below 60% within the next five years as technology companies chip away at banks' grip on financial services, a new survey from TransferWise, a London-based money-transfer company, predicts.