Competitive Strategies

Remember micropayments? Most payments providers gave up on this class of electronic payments several years ago when it became apparent that technology couldn’t crack the problem of high-cost transactions applied to very low-value goods. But now at least one player is attacking the market with cryptocurrency. On Track Innovations Ltd., …

Denizen Financial Inc., a San Francisco-based startup backed by one of Spain’s biggest banks, has created what it calls “the first true global, borderless account” that allows customers to receive money in one country and pay it out in another while avoiding international transfer fees and foreign-exchange fees. Denizen says …

E-commerce platform provider Shopify Inc. chose Google’s cloud services to help host its online stores, Bloomberg reported. Payments provider Net Element Inc. said Jonathan Fichman, a former Bank of America Merrill Lynch executive who currently is managing director of C-Anax Ventures & Advisory, joined its board of directors.

Buy online, pick up in store is now a mainstream expectation for consumers, finds a survey from Kibo Software Inc., an e-commerce platform provider. In the Kibo “2018 Consumer Trends Report” of 3,000 U.S. consumers, 67% said they made a purchase online and picked it up in a store in …

With about 18 months of experience with contactless debit cards under its belt, TCF Financial Corp. says it’s all-in for so-called dual-interface cards and mobile payments as the number of U.S. merchant locations accepting contactless payments continues to grow. The Wayzata, Minn.-based company’s TCF Bank began supporting the major mobile …

Square Inc. is testing a program that gives consumers $1 off purchases at coffee shops when they pay with Square Cash, MarketWatch reported. Payout provider Hyperwallet announced that tilr, a recruiting platform, is using Hyperwallet for payouts to its clients. Candex, a business-services payments provider for purchases of under $100,000, …

Kiosks, and the technology that supports them, are hardly new. We’ve been using kiosks to check in at the airport and print out a wedding registry at our local home-goods store for years. But today, kiosks are moving into fast-food restaurants, rental-car stores, drugstores, malls, and everywhere in between. In …

Machine learning and huge swaths of data are being enlisted in the battle to counter online fraud, with CyberSource announcing an enhancement to its fraud-prevention service and processor Worldpay Inc. launching a new fraud-prevention service Wednesday at MRC 2018, the annual conference held by the Merchant Risk Council. CyberSource, a …

E-commerce fraud over a two-year period through the end of 2017 increased 7% across all merchant categories, finds the Ecommerce Fraud Index released Tuesday by fraud-prevention specialist Signifyd Inc. The index reported the level of total fraud losses increased from 3.8% of sales volume in 2016 to 4.09% in 2017. …

PayPal Holdings Inc.’s Pay After Delivery service will end April 19 for U.S. buyers. San Jose, Calif.-based PayPal included notice of the discontinuance in recent emails to account holders about the latest changes to its policies, and through a posting on the PayPal Web site. With Pay After Delivery, which …