News

April, 2016

• 28 April

  ETA’s Oxman Says San Francisco Office Is Indicative of Payments-Industry Change

  The Electronic Transactions Association, a trade group based in Washington, D.C., that represents the merchant-services industry, has opened an office in San Francisco, its first outside of the nation’s capital. The move is indicative of Silicon Valley’s growing presence within the payments industry and, specifically, within merchant services, says Jason …
• 27 April

  Financial Executives Worry About More Fraud With Same-Day ACH

  The coming of same-day settlement of automated clearing house transactions to the U.S. next September has many bank and credit-union executives excited about the prospect of faster payments. But fears about more fraud are rising, too. A recent survey of approximately 60 financial institutions by New York City-based fraud-control firm …
• 27 April

  Eye on Merchant Funding: Shopify Enters the Fray, and Citi Invests in Cloud Funder BlueVine

  It may have started with the likes of PayPal Holdings Inc. and Square Inc., but it isn’t stopping there. Having made their mark in merchant processing, high-tech payments firms are increasingly turning their attention to the business of offering funding to the merchants they serve. The move is bringing them …
• 27 April

  U.S. EMV Shipments Spur Smart Card Growth and other Digital Transactions News briefs

  • Apple Inc. CEO Tim Cook reported at the company’s latest quarterly earnings call that the Apple Pay contactless mobile-payment service “is growing at a tremendous rate” and has more than five times the transaction volume it had a year ago, but he didn’t give numbers. The service, which is …
• 27 April

  Venmo And One Touch Help Buoy PayPal While Big Merchants Squeeze Its Margins

  When it comes to mobile payments, few operators can equal PayPal Holdings Inc., a fact the company underlined on Wednesday when it reported mobile volume reached $21 billion in the first quarter, up fully 54% year-over-year. But casting a shadow over the good news was a continuing downward trend in …
• 26 April

  Retailers Are More Confident About Speedy Breach Detection, But Should They Be?

  With data breaches continuing to plague the payments business, and with major incidents like that of Target Corp. still fresh in the minds of payments professionals, you might think retailers would be cautious these days about their ability to ward off attackers. Not so, according to survey data released Tuesday …
• 26 April

  Meeting Security Demands in Digital Experiences Presents a POS Challenge

  Merchants attempting to create more digital experiences in their stores and restaurants because of consumer expectations are finding security of payments to be a significant challenge, finds the “Step Up The In-Person Experience” report issued by Forrester Consulting Inc. Commissioned by tablet point-of-sale maker Revel Systems, the report examines how …
• 26 April

  Ziosk Inks Content Deal and other Digital Transactions News briefs

  • The PCI Security Standards Council said it will publish version 3.2 of the Payment Card Industry data-security standard this Thursday. • Ziosk LLC, a provider of tablets for at-table payment in restaurants, announced deals with several entertainment providers for new content on its installed base of 170,000 devices. • …
• 25 April

  The Fed’s Faster Payments Task Force and McKinsey Get Set to Weigh Industry Proposals

  With just five days remaining, organizations developing so-called faster-payments systems are submitting proposals for evaluation by a consulting firm retained by the Federal Reserve Board’s Faster Payments Task Force. On Monday, The Clearing House Payments Co. LLC, which is building a real-time payments system with Fidelity National Information Services Inc., …
• 25 April

  Attrition Among Profitable Small Businesses Takes a Toll on First Data’s Merchant Unit

  Despite 7% transaction growth, First Data Corp. on Monday reported that revenue in the company’s North American merchant-processing business declined 2% in the first quarter. In an early-morning conference call with analysts, First Data executives several times blamed attrition among small and mid-sized North American businesses, or SMBs, in its …