Competitive Strategies

Mobile-payments specialist xPressTap Inc. launched its Tap2App product that enables merchants to accept contactless card payments wirelessly using a near-field communication-equipped mobile device. American Express Co. said it now provides an integrated service to MineralTree, an accounts-payable service, to ease business-to-business payments. Payments provider Integrity Payment Systems announced a partnership with Operation First Response, a …

Slowly but surely, a new version of the Bitcoin digital currency was emerging early Tuesday in what appeared to be the start of a hard fork in the Bitcoin code. The fork is expected to yield a parallel blockchain to support the new cryptocurrency, which is known as Bitcoin Cash. …

Payments veteran and Harbortouch founder Jared Isaacman announced the formation of Lighthouse Network LLC, a company that will provide shared services, such as payment processing, merchant-support responsibilities, and corporate functions to Harbortouch, and eventually other brands, which could be acquired through strategic means, a Lighthouse Network spokesman said. Isaacman said in a press …

Enabling cross-border payments for e-commerce transactions will take on greater importance if forecasts hold true. That means payments companies wanting to serve these merchants will have to adopt services that accommodate international payments. While U.S. and Canadian consumers will spend an estimated $72.7 billion on cross-border e-commerce in 2017, that …

Millennials don’t care for or trust the traditional advertising tactics that have been a staple of the payments industry for eons—84% say they don’t like them at all. For consumer-facing brands, the implications of these findings are quite significant—particularly since cultivating and rewarding customer loyalty is a foundational marketing element. …

Some 57% of large companies are either seriously studying or in the process of deploying blockchain technology, according to a Juniper Research survey of nearly 400 company executives. Most-often-cited uses include settlement, land registry, and digital fiat currency. The study cautions, though, that some companies may be underestimating both the challenges of …

Month by month, U.S. merchants are steadily switching on EMV capability to accept chip cards, but often overlooked is how more small merchants are simply adding credit and debit card payments, whether chip-based or not. As a result, card payment volume at small merchants has risen almost 7% over the …

Two recent studies have produced some interesting insights about person-to-person payments. One spells out the similarities among users of prepaid cards and P2P services. The other shows just how strong PayPal Holdings Inc.’s hold in money transfers and P2P and other payments is. The findings about prepaid and P2P come …

Mastercard Inc. reported Thursday that its switched transaction volume grew 17% in the second quarter. Meanwhile, Discover Financial Services’ Pulse debit network saw volume jump 15% after growing slightly in the first quarter following a long period of decline. Purchase, N.Y.-based Mastercard said its transaction count hit 16 billion versus …

PayPal Holdings Inc. and Bank of America Corp. announced an agreement whereby PayPal will tokenize BofA cards for in-store transactions based on the PayPal wallet. The in-store payments will work with a PayPal service using near-field communication that PayPal says is coming, without adding details. Discover Financial Services said in its second quarter earnings …