December, 2024

• 1 December

  Payments 3.0: The CFPB And the Future of Open Banking

  

  Beyond opposing a sweeping new rule on data sharing, the financial industry will have to cope with the new digital reality that led to the rule. In October, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau issued its final rule on “Personal Financial Data Rights.” To oversimplify, it requires that companies share their …
• 1 December

  Security Notes: An Open Letter to President Elect Trump

  

  Digital money may turn out to be the biggest global story of the first half of the 21st century. The phenomenon was launched by Bitcoin, and its promise only begins to unfold. Payments, loans, credit, growth, innovation, charity, and efficiency are already showing the welcome impact of the new form …
• 1 December

  How Embedded Finance Is Finding New Outlets

  

  Talk of embedded finance—the marrying of financial services with unrelated applications for businesses—is in the air, and most recently was a dominant theme at the big Money 20/20 conference in October in Las Vegas. The discussion comes as fintechs and financial institutions devise initiatives that extend beyond simple credit and …

November, 2024

• 1 November

  Security Notes: LoanChain: A New Market for Entrepreneurs

  

  Blockchain is robbing traditional banks. It’s yanking money from beyond concrete walls, metal locks, and private ledgers and putting it behind cryptographic walls, mathematical locks, and public ledgers. As legacy banks gasp for air, here comes the one-two-punch: LoanChain. Its blow may be deeper at the core level. Banks make …
• 1 November

  Payments 3.0: For AI, Have a Strategy First

  

  Success with artificial intelligence is about strategy, but most conversations about AI today focus on tactics. Although financial services have used AI for decades, the growth of generative AI has led to a broader set of use cases. Innovators are looking for ways to apply artificial intelligence to everything from …
• 1 November

  How Illinois’s Interchange Case Has Transfixed the Industry

  

  Plaintiffs in a lawsuit seeking to overturn the Illinois Interchange Fee Prohibition Act filed motions last month requesting the court deny a request from several merchant organizations to join the Illinois Attorney General as defendants in the suit. The case, which involves a recent Illinois law that prohibits interchange on …

October, 2024

• 1 October

  Payments 3.0: Humanity And the War on Gift Card Fraud

  

  One morning, I was checking out at a grocery store when I saw the store manager rush out of her office. “Who has the big gift card purchase?” she asked, hurrying down the row of cash registers. She had gotten a call alerting her to a fraudulent transaction and asking …
• 1 October

  Security Notes: Where Money Goes, Attention Flows

  

  Money is traditionally defined as a medium of exchange, unit of measurement, and store of value, which is true. But this definition hides the underlying attribute of currency. Money, currency, is the riverbed that guides where the river flows. Where money goes, attention flows. Society moves forward by paying attention …
• 1 October

  The CFPB Reviews Cash Back at the Point of Sale

  

  Retailers providing cash-back services at the point of sale fill a void for many consumers who may live in so-called banking deserts, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau says in a recent report on the service. Some, however, charge a fee for that access, among other banking hurdles. The Cash-back Fees …

September, 2024

• 1 September

  Payments 3.0: Cool Off And Reconsider

  

  The payments industry seems to be gearing up for more lawsuits in the wake of a recent Supreme Court decision, but cooler heads should prevail. In June, the Court issued a decision in Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo, Secretary of Commerce, that overtuned the Chevron Doctrine. In 1984, the Court …