Acquiring

First Data Corp. reported Monday that transaction volume in its North American merchant-acquiring business grew 7% year-over-year in the first quarter to 11.5 billion. Attrition in First Data’s direct small and mid-sized (SMB) merchant business, which had been a problem for more than a year, improved, but sales leads from …

• Repeal of the Durbin Amendment took a step closer to reality with the passage of the Financial Choice Act by the House Financial Services Committee by a 34-26 vote. The full House is expected to take up the bill by the end of the month. • MoneyGram International Inc. said …

• Two executives of Commerce Payment Systems, which had been a Hewlett, N.Y.-based independent sales organization, have been charged in a $30 million scheme that overbilled more than 10,000 merchants, announced the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York this week following the unsealing of an indictment. The charges …

The numbers moved in the right direction for Square Inc. in the first quarter, with gross payment volume up 33% and profitability measures improving. But an analyst urged the merchant acquirer to disclose more data about its fast-growing but potentially volatile loan business called Square Capital. San Francisco-based Square reported Wednesday …

• Apple Inc., in its results for the second quarter ending April 1, said Apple Pay is available now in 15 markets, having launched in Taiwan and Ireland in March. Globally, that includes 20 million contactless-ready locations, of which 4.5 million are in the United States, said chief executive Tim Cook during …

• Processing giant First Data Corp. and cross-border payments specialist Flywire Corp. announced a collaboration by which Flywire education and health-care clients will be able to more easily accept cross-border card payments and First Data clients will be able to more readily accept high-value international remittances. • Gro Solutions, a vendor of digital solutions …

• Former Heartland Payment Systems Inc. chief executive Bob Carr has returned to the payments industry with Beyond, a payments provider. Announced Monday, Beyond, on its Web site, says it will provide payment processing, integrated payments, lending services, and business-management services. Carr had been the leader of Heartland, which Global Payments Inc. acquired for …

Merchants like programs that cover their credit card acceptance costs. So do ISOs and acquirers, some of which see a big opportunity in programs that help merchants with surcharging. Surcharging for credit card transactions or offering a cash discount may have obvious benefits for merchants, but these programs also carry …

Restaurants have been slow to bite on EMV. To get adoption percolating, vendors are introducing methods that let customers add a tip after making a payment or pay with tabletop devices. Paying with EMV cards has been an adjustment for the average U.S. consumer. Cards are no longer swiped. They …

Consulting firm The Strawhecker Group is out with its 2016 rankings of U.S. merchant acquirers, and they show that 240 acquirers and independent sales organizations processed more than $5 trillion in payment volume. The 10 biggest acquirers accounted for 80% of that volume. Topping the list is JPMorgan Chase & …