Competitive Strategies

Shopify Inc. is often thought of as a platform for smaller e-commerce merchants, but it offers processing services for some 65,000 physical-world sellers, as well, and on Thursday it unveiled a new EMV card reader that features a Bluetooth low-energy link to mobile devices and what the company says is …

Are so-called bots the future of commerce? The digital gadgets took another step in that direction Tuesday with a flurry of announcements at a Facebook conference regarding new bot launches on the social network’s massive Messenger app. Mastercard Inc. said it has enabled its Masterpass digital wallet for use with …

U.S. Bancorp, owner of the big merchant acquirer Elavon Inc., generated 36% of its first-quarter non-interest income from payments, according to the Minneapolis-based company’s first-quarter earnings report released Wednesday. U.S. Bancorp reported $849 million of its total $2.33 billion in non-interest income came from payment sources such merchant fees, interchange …

Offering a surcharging or cash-discounting program to merchants has obvious revenue benefits to merchants, but they have the potential to grow an independent sales organization’s or acquirer’s bottom line, too. Such programs enable merchants to cover their costs to accept credit card transactions by adding a fee to the purchase …

• USA Technologies Inc. announced it will work with point-of-sale terminal maker Ingenico to make Ingenico contact-EMV hardware available to providers of vending machines and other unattended terminals that use USAT’s network for contactless payments. • In related news, Mastercard Inc. said it is making its Masterpass digital wallet available for purchases …

When PayPal Holdings Inc. made deals last year with Visa Inc., Mastercard Inc., Citigroup Inc., and Fidelity National Information Services (FIS), one key part of the agreements was access to the card networks’ tokenization engines to reach bank-issued payment cards. On Tuesday,

• Wireless payments specialist Apriva announced a new vending payment product for Canada that enables contactless payments and chip card transactions. • Point-of-sale equipment and services distributor POS Portal announced that it and processor Vantiv Inc. have simplified the equipment-distribution process for merchants, value-added resellers, and independent software vendors using the processor’s services. • Credit-union …

Financial institutions are determined not to be left behind as mobile person-to-person payments gain popularity and non-bank players invade the market. On Monday, Early Warning Services LLC, a company controlled by some of the nation’s biggest banks, said its Zelle P2P service has grown to include 20 banks and credit …

• In the wake of a rival bid from Euronet Worldwide Inc., Ant Financial Services Group increased its offer for MoneyGram International Inc. from $880 million to $1.2 billion, or from $13.25 per share to $18. Euronet offered $1 billion for MoneyGram after Ant made its original bid. A special MoneyGram …

Klarna Inc.’s new boss has big ambitions. Jim Lofgren, vice president of global accounts and partnerships for the Swedish payments processor’s U.S. operation, tells Digital Transactions News there’s plenty of room for growth in what many might perceive as a saturated market for retail credit. “In the U.S., we see …