Real-time payments

The Clearing House has become one of the first Mastercard-certified, third-party token service providers on behalf of issuing banks.

The Federal Reserve Board governor sketched out a future in which U.S. banks remain at the center of commercial transactions.

Same-day ACH debits rolled out last month, a year after same-day credits, cutting processing time for these payments from a couple of days to a few hours — but for many emerging use cases, that’s not fast enough. And debit is filling the void.

Following an antitrust review that lasted almost a year, the approval would appear to cement The Clearing House's status as the front-runner in a race to modernize the U.S. payments system.

The central bank said Wednesday that it will assess a range of options regarding its operational role in a modernized payment system, an issue that divides large and small banks.

New European standards require greater data sharing to accommodate faster transaction processing, mobile payments and other digital efforts — a trend that is also inspiring new collaborations across the pond.

Fiserv's acquisition of U.K.-based real-time payments provider Dovetail Group Ltd. is a move made with a global vision in mind.

Four months after partnering with linked2pay's Bank Centric Payments platform, ICBA Bancard says it will support real-time posting of payments for community banks and their small business customers.

Purchasing VocaLink has cost Mastercard more than $900 million and some regulatory headaches, but the investment has to potential to spark new payment products and facilitate the card brand's pursuit of faster processing.

In early fall, the central bank is expected to announce its next steps regarding how to improve the aging U.S. payments system.