Payments

Education payments company peerTransfer has grown quickly by providing a specialized service to a specific market, but it may be time for it graduate to new lines of business.

Government officials in Gujarat will partner with MasterCard to pursue a goal of being the first state in India to have a digital payments system.

First Premier Bank, a subprime credit card issuer, has given up a court fight aimed at keeping information about its cards off a comparison-shopping website.

While many agree that usernames and passwords should give way to more advanced identity management, progress toward this goal has been extremely slow.

The telco-led mobile wallet venture Softcard has laid off 60 employees and is consolidating its offices, a sign that the company's staffing may have been oversized compared to its opportunities in the market.

PayPal is enabling monthly installment for larger purchases and offering business consulting, a move that will allow the company to handle larger transactions and extend its merchant services.

The San Jose-based payment terminal maker Verifone launched a new mobile operating system and is separately working with Samsung on new mobile point of sale projects.

Global payment solutions provider Elavon has partnered with Verizon to bring mobile point of sale products to Verizon's small-business customers.

Tritium Partners has acquired a majority stake in Giact Systems LLC, an electric payments service.

French payment companies are stepping up the use technology that can spot certain types of card fraud that are not prevented by EMV-chip security.

The extended leave of Starbucks' chief operating officer, Troy Alstead, could indicate that last year's creation of the COO post has succeeded in furthering the coffee chain's mobile payments initiatives.

Apple Pay will expand to Canada this year, according to a report by 9to5Mac, a news site that follows Apple's activities.

Nine Polish banks are pushing ahead with the country's mobile payment efforts, promising to launch a Visa-backed, cloud-based contactless service early this year.

One of the clearest things that sets Apple Pay apart from other mobile wallets is its incorporation of Touch ID fingerprint recognition. Now that Apple has opened up Touch ID to outside developers, the fingerprint tech is spreading throughout — and in some cases beyond — Apple's ecosystem.

By targeting construction lending, 1st Financial Bank USA aims to expand beyond its hefty concentration in credit card loans while entering a business segment that has shrunk mightily since the financial crisis.

Starbucks Corp. Chief Operating Officer Troy Alstead will go on an extended unpaid hiatus, leaving the world’s largest coffee-shop chain without a No. 2 to Chief Executive Officer Howard Schultz.

Traditional merchant acquirers have faced disruption from a number of new entrants in recent years from companies such as Square and its peers. And now, a football team is getting into the game.

Revolving consumer credit in the U.S. fell in November by the largest amount in a year, according to a report Thursday from the Federal Reserve Board.

The earliest implementations of the 3D Secure e-commerce system amounted to a password for consumers' payment cards and a link between consumer and card issuer — an idea that is growing stale in a world where consumers are able to authenticate payments with more sophisticated tech.

PayPal's mobile payments application can now be accessed by BlackBerry users in the United States, United Kingdom and Australia, with plans for more markets later on.