The SEC asked Groupon to explain its accounting for coupon refunds and other aspects of its business after the daily deal site revised 2011 results and disclosed a “material weakness” in its financial controls. Groupon recently entered the payments industry by offering a mobile card reader for Groupon merchants.

The storm left many without electricity, phones and use of the roads. But in many of the affected areas, consumers and merchants continued to conduct business and found a way to handle payments.

The dominant prepaid card marketers, Green Dot and NetSpend, faced a new and significant rival with the launch two weeks ago of the Bluebird card by American Express and Wal-Mart. Both prepaid companies are expressing early optimism — but long-term uncertainty looms.

NXP Semiconductors has developed a touch sensor that could combat thieves using a mobile scanner to attempt to steal account details from contactless payment cards.

American Express is seeking to lure gamers by awarding special deals to Xbox 360 players tied to their performance in the soon-to-be-released “Halo 4” video game.

When Roam Data promoted Ken Paull from his executive vice president role to be its new CEO in late September, he knew he would be steering the company through a complicated and growing mobile payments landscape with numerous sellers and buyers.

Green Dot announced Thursday that its quarterly earnings fell 20% from a year ago as competition intensified in the prepaid card market.

COLUMBUS, Ohio – The Ohio Credit Union League launched a newly redesigned website yesterday that will make it easier for member credit unions to navigate, find information and do more online functions.

WHITEHALL, Mich. – HarborLight CU has signed with Geezeo to implement the company’s white label personal financial management and engagement banking solution.

ENFIELD, Conn. – 360 FCU has signed with TRC Interactive for the company’s Web-based training through its CreditUnionTrainingOnline.

LONG BEACH, Calif. – LBS Financial CU has implemented Financial Industry Computer Systems’ updated version of Loan Producer with streamlined loan file workflow and user interface.

Two shopping experiences and a well-timed commercial from Isis indicate tapping a payment-capable phone against a reader may, in fact, be so much easier than swiping a plastic card … so long as merchants have complete buy-in.

Google added a mobile commerce payment option to Google Wallet, which already supports online and point of sale purchases.

Vantiv, the payments processor, is buying Litle & Co., which processes payments for companies that sell to goods and services to consumers via the Internet, for $361 million.

Government benefits departments in Canada can now instantly issue open-loop, reloadable prepaid cards, which reduce costs by eliminating the need for checks.

California-based Tipalti offers an automated mass payment system for companies to send money with a wide range of payment methods to their partners all over the world.

Aiming to bring confidence to the secure mobile services space, Fime launched its GlobalPlatform trusted execution environment, or TEE, test tool Wednesday.

MINNEAPOLIS – Cachet Financial Solutions has teamed with PreCash to provide instant remote check deposits to a companion prepaid card.

EMC has agreed to buy Silver Tail Systems, a privately held company that helps clients fend off fraudsters and Web-based attackers.

After more than a year of planning and regulatory scrutiny, a United Kingdom mobile commerce joint venture called Project Oscar isn’t quite ready to call itself a mobile wallet or payments service.