Competitive Strategies

The combined effect of five payments trends is chipping away at cash reliance, finds a new report from Deloitte. Increasing adoption of stablecoin payments, especially for cross-border payments, increased speed of transactions, using data standards to one’s advantage, agentic artificial-intelligence commerce, and employing AI to counter fraud are all shaping …

Bluwhale AI Inc. has launched its AI Stablecoin Agent, aimed at helping individuals automate their management of dollar-denominated digital-currency assets. American Express Co. announced it is working with the International Downtown Association to award more than $1.4 million in grants to 97 small and independently owned restaurants in 14 cities outside the …

FICO (Fair Isaac Corp.) has partnered with open-banking platform Plaid Inc. to develop the UltraFICO score, a credit score that includes real-time cash-flow data from Plaid. The new scoring model is intended to give lenders a more comprehensive view of a consumer’s credit readiness. The UltraFICO score will weigh a …

Afterpay, the buy now, pay later option from Block Inc., will soon test a new way to use the payment method at the point of sale with a Visa debit card. Meanwhile, rival BNPL provider Klarna AB is expanding the locations where consumers can use Klarna to make gift card …

President Trump nominated Stuart Levenbach to be the new permanent director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. Levenbach is a senior official at the Office of Management and Budget. Acting director Russell Vought’s term is set to expire in December under the Vacancies Act.  Toast Inc. said it will grant $10,000 to …

Shift4 Payments Inc. continues to stack up wins in the highly competitive stadium-pay market. The company announced early Wednesday it will process stadium-concessions payments for the Ottawa Senators of the National Hockey League at the team’s home arena, Canadian Tire Centre. The deal, which comes hard on the heels of Shift4’s …

PayPal Holdings Inc. said it is an official digital payments partner with U.K.-based soccer club Liverpool FC. Already an option in the club’s digital payments platforms, PayPal will be featured more prominently on checkout and payment screens in the club’s e-commerce and All Red services. All Red is a membership program …

Fiserv Inc.’s Clover point-of-sale technology unit has signed a deal with the Minnesota Wild of the National Hockey League to provide its Clover Sport point-of-sale hardware and software at the Wild’s home stadium, Grand Casino Arena. Fiserv will deploy about 300 Clover devices at concession stands throughout the arena. Fiserv’s Clover unit …

Klarna AB early Tuesday reported a 26% jump in revenue for its September quarter, to $903 million, the highest revenue number in its 20-year history. The Sweden-based company, which maintains major operations in the U.S. market and internationally, said it processed $32.7 billion in transactions for the quarter, up 23%. …

Nacha, the automated clearing house rule maker, is soliciting feedback on potentially increasing the transaction size of a same-day ACH payment from $1 million to $10 million. Comments are being accepted through Dec. 18. Steamboat Capital sent an open letter to the directors of Priority Technology Holdings Inc. expressing disappointment in an …