Payments

The U.S. Treasury Department is in talks with some airlines about accepting their loyalty programs as collateral against government loans to help them weather the coronavirus crisis.

Banco Santander has launched a new standalone international money transfer service called PagoFX in the U.K. to compete with fintechs.

Airwallex has raised $160 million in a Series D fundraising round to expand global payment offerings for small businesses and enterprises.

Hilton Worldwide Holdings Inc. is raising cash by selling loyalty points and offering bonds as the company rides out the coronavirus crisis.

IT projects are under scrutiny due to the coronavirus, not only in terms of budgets but also how fast firms can deploy automation for tasks such as business payments for companies that have turned to remote work.

While the primary focus for most credit card providers in March was on emphasizing fee forgiveness and payment deferral support, moving forward issuers need to focus on a mix of strategies to retain their cardholders' share of spend, says The Futurist Group's Demitry Estrin.

OCBC Bank has integrated Google Pay into its P2P transfer service, thereby expanding its customers’ options for reducing their cash usage during the coronavirus crisis.

Even before the coronavirus pandemic, it was becoming clear that the work of the past decade to establish the Single Euro Payment Area was paying off with real-time payments networks and opening possibilities for another European payments scheme.

The benefits of virtual payment cards go beyond replacing physical cards and eliminating social contacts. Payment vendors that manage these virtual cards can also create branded cards and portals for companies, says Berkeley Payments' Jonathan Hamburg.

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau wants to make it easier for those who lack bank accounts to receive pandemic relief payments authorized by Congress.