Payments

The mainstream adoption of Bitcoin is getting a boost from credit card giant Visa Inc., which joined startup Fold to offer a card that earns rewards denominated in the cryptocurrency instead of airline miles or cash.

With the EMV liability shift date for automated fuel dispensers (AFD) looming, subject to any last-minute changes, we are seeing major changes at fuel sites across the USA. With close to 150,000 active fuel sites in the U.S. alone, there are a huge number of individual pumps that will need to be upgraded to accept chip and PIN cards.

Fintechs, startups and bank-led projects were already working to excise generations of inefficiencies out of supply chains. The coronavirus has heightened the need for smooth payments.

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.

The amount of money migrant workers send to their home countries usually holds up well in a crisis. Not this time.

For decades, automated check reconciliation stood out as the lone sanctuary for AR professionals. However, the advent of payment automation indicates that electronic payment reconciliation is more than capable of taking up the baton, says Nvoicepay's Kim Lockett.

While reports of toilet paper and hand-sanitizer shortages may be common stories on the nightly news, one consumer goods category is flying off the shelves at an even faster pace, one never seen before – guns and ammunition, increasing payments volume for gun shops, a merchant category financial service providers traditionally avoid.

The coronavirus has accelerated a move toward a public option for digital wallets that would tie government authentication to payment transactions. If successful, this could be the catalyst for a national digital identity system.

The “hold” period has shrunk considerably, from 10 business days to typically now three, one or zero, making it harder to spot suspicious activity, says FICO's Liz Lasher.

Five Democrats on the Senate Banking Committee sent a letter to Director Kathy Kraninger calling the agency's response to COVID-19 “tepid and ineffectual at best.”

The acquisition would give SoFi control of a technology platform that is currently used by some of its competitors in digital banking.

After considering requests from competition agencies in six nations, the European Commission says Mastercard's acquisition of a majority of Denmark payments provider Nets last summer may violate antitrust rules.

Cash and digital payments don’t have to be mutually exclusive; this is not a zero-sum game as the two payment options can exist together, says PPRO's Steve Villegas.

The coronavirus pandemic is likely to force a great leap forward in the fight to crush paper checks, which still account for about half of B2B payments, by moving more invoice payments online.

As risk assets regain their mojo amid optimism the coronavirus spread is beginning to level off, Bitcoin’s back above $7,000.

The Fed plans to make its National Settlement System (NSS) more available. This will help Nacha broaden its settlement capabilities to new regions, writes Icon Solutions' Gene Neyer.

A group of investors sued four cryptocurrency exchanges and seven issuers claiming they sold billions of dollars of unregistered digital tokens and other securities in violation of U.S. securities laws.

The cryptocurrency industry’s struggles to attract mainstream investment continued last year as global fund raising and deals both dried up, according to a new report from PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP.

The U.S. Treasury is talking to digital payments providers about quick ways to disburse funds to recipients of stimulus checks within a couple of weeks, but payments industry experts foresee troubling security issues even with most of the obvious options.

Mastercard has increased the contactless payment limit to CA$250 across Canada to provide consumers with a safer way to pay during the coronavirus pandemic.