Retailers

Passengers are warming to non-travel mobile payments, and the technology is advancing to enable mobile payments in flight, writes Kristian Gjerding, CEO of CellPoint Mobile.

The $13.7 billion acquisition could have significant implications for swipe-fee revenue and other grocers' in-store branches. It also raises the question of whether the Seattle e-commerce goliath will soon set its sights on the financial services industry.

Until now, Amazon's moves seemed like cautious pokes at the deeply ingrained habit of going to a store and paying with a plastic card. Furthermore, any competitors may have seen Amazon's lacking retail store presence as a buffer that kept them at least temporarily safe from the same fate that befell the bookselling world. How naive they were.

Amazon has been making some aggressive moves in the grocery industry in recent months, but perhaps none so aggressive as its just-announced deal to buy Whole Foods for $13.7 billion.

Younger consumers spend much of their time on messaging platforms, creating a risk for retailers that are not active in the channel.

A deeper dive into the workings of the Amazon Prime Reload program should give the card payments industry serious cause for concern.

Consumers don't want to feel disconnected from retailers in e-commerce, and don't want a complicated checkout experience, writes Jason Fordham, vice president of product at SmarterHQ.

The task at hand for retail app developers is increasingly clear: Make it as easy as possible for consumers to pay through a mobile device.

In a move that will certainly cause friction across the card payments industry, Amazon announced a new service called Amazon Prime Reload, which incentivizes newcomers to the program to load funds using a debit card or bank account with a 2% cash back on purchases.

Federal law established oversight of banks’ security measures, but the lack of similar requirements for retailers creates a blind spot in defending against hacks.