Retailers

Some virtual currencies are getting narrower focuses on individual categories such as dentistry, and Burger King will soon find out if the concept is transferrable to Russian fast food.

Millennial purchases are fueled by convenience, efficiency and value, and with the recent announcement of Instant Pick Up, Amazon has taken another step in the right direction, writes Gil Don, CEO of Splitit.

NCR Corp. has entered a strategic referral relationship with Performance Food Group Co. (PFG) to promote NCR’s payments services to hundreds of restaurants via the food service operator’s 36 national distribution centers.

The National Institute of Standards and Technology is telling agencies and companies that collect or store data to change the way they have been protecting their networks — and its guidance is likely to soon spill over to financial services and payments.

Alternative currency investments are volatile. Another way to look at the market's sustainability is the willingness of participants to stick with this new mode of payments, writes Mariam Nishanian, a representative for Dentacoin, a virtual currency for the dental industry.

Amazon.com Inc.’s proposed $13.7 billion purchase of Whole Foods Market Inc. won quick U.S. antitrust approval, showing that concerns in Washington about the growing power of technology companies weren’t enough to derail the online retailer’s biggest-ever acquisition.

As marketing becomes more expensive, issuers are under pressure to find new ways to lure merchants, according to Eric Marks and Sean Clark from West Monroe Partners.

Contactless payments today seem to address the slowness of EMV contact without compromising security. And unbeknownst to many, it uses the same security protocol, writes Andrey Tikhonov, senior director of payment technology for Infinite Peripherals.

OnlyID, a joint offering from FIS and Equifax, is meant to become consumers’ single sign-on for bank and retail websites and apps. Longstanding relationships may give it a better shot at achieving network effect than previous attempts.

Amazon casts a huge shadow over the retail industry, but it can be as much an inspiration as a threat.