Mobile payments

Google’s reported plan to offer its own version of the Apple Card is less of a play for credit and more of a play for its mobile users' bank accounts.

The trend to mobile is accelerating due to government stimulus checks, closed bank branches and the move to e-commerce, sayd Mitek's Michael Diamond.

Contactless technology provider Mobeewave is launching tap-to-phone features that remove current contactless payment limits for merchants and consumers globally.

As Amazon and e-commerce companies in parallel broadened their adoption rates, they further trained consumers to expect a frictionless and speedy checkout process, says Grubbrr's Bhavin Asher.

Huawei Pay hopes to benefit from UnionPay's network and scale as it launches in Singapore, a market that already has several large mobile pay apps including Apple Pay.

Analytical technology will be key for firms looking to appeal to the next generation of customers. Having come of age in the midst of the 2008 financial crisis, secure personal finance is extremely important to this generation, says Axis Communications' Stephen Joseph.

While much of the world is sheltering at home to deter the spread of coronavirus, there's still a need for essential workers to travel — and an opportunity for the development of in-car payments technology, which could allow consumers to pay for gas or food without handling cash or other potentially infected surfaces.

Former NetSpend CEO Dan Henry has been named as the CEO of Green Dot, the Pasadena, Calif.-based prepaid card issuer and banking company.

By embracing technology such as magnetic stripe when it seemed modern, the U.S. has been slower to catch up with much newer digital innovation, argues MSTS' Brandon Spear.

As coronavirus forces most shopping to occur online, merchants will likely see their product return policies tested by both good customers and the unsavory ones who abuse those policies for profit.