Payments

In what could be seen as another salvo in the battle between payments and financial services 'disruptors' and more traditional financial institutions, five large technology companies — Google, Amazon, Apple, PayPal and Intuit — have formed a lobbying and advocacy group.

Mobile commerce provider P97 is partnering with SAP Vehicles Network to include its fuel payment platform with SAP's cloud-based automobile operating system.

By dropping out of the mobile card reader business, Amazon is focusing on the one-click Pay with Amazon app and further embedding payments into its customer relationship management.

MasterCard has appointed Craig Vosburg to president of North America markets.

Financial services technology company Fiserv and bank-owned risk management provider Early Warning are partnering to add scale for deposit accounts and bill payment services.

Mobile payments provider iZettle has expanded into Italy, where it will offer its free mobile card reader to small merchants as well as its wireless contactless payment acceptance device.

JPMorgan Chase agreed to pay California $50 million to resolve claims the bank cheated tens of thousands of credit-card customers while collecting debts from them, California Attorney General Kamala Harris said.

For a time, the European payments market was considered fertile ground for the creation of a third card network to compete against heavyweights Visa Europe and MasterCard. This third network never came to be, but European banks kept the idea on the back burner as a way to compete against or even bypass the major card brands.

In wearables, one size doesn't fit all. Some Apple Watch owners may never use Apple Pay; others may consider it a must-have feature.

Visa's agreement to reunite with Visa Europe positions the global card brand to better address a world where payments and commerce have fewer borders.

Visa's agreement to reunite with Visa Europe positions the global card brand to better address a world where payments and commerce have fewer borders.

Gift cards don't seem like the coolest technology in the payments world, but new and reinvented digital gifting platforms are changing the conversation – by borrowing text-messaging staples like emoji.

Digital commerce and payments company Mozido has named R. Todd Bradley as its new chief executive.

To improve its commerce and restaurant management offerings, Heartland Payment Systems has acquired Digital Dining, a provider of software that enables handheld point of sale devices to interact with conventional fixed terminals.

Apple Pay hasn't gone too far with consumers in its first year, but it has nevertheless established a solid footing with merchants, banks and two generations of its own handsets. And Apple has many powerful rivals that are eager to surpass it.

FIS is taking a major step toward completing its ongoing project of making it possible for people to pay for fuel without getting out of the car.

As many a card expert warned would be the case, there's still a lot of confusion out there about how chip cards work—and what they don't do.

If Visa and MasterCard seem to be shining an extremely bright spotlight on their tokenization efforts, it's because they view it as vital to their survival.

Starbucks Corp. now gets 21% of its U.S. sales in company-owned stores through its mobile app, and its new order-and-pay system looks to be just as popular.

The RushCard debacle should lead to consumer improvements, but it should not undercut the progress prepaid has made in helping consumers manage their finances.