With his eponymous Durbin Amendment, passed into law just over a decade ago, Illinois’s senior senator intended to hurt large banks, along with Visa and Mastercard. The text, however, couldn’t be as expressly punitive as Durbin might have liked. He would likely have preferred capping debit interchange and network acquirer …
Read More »As Buy Now, Pay Later Usage Rises, It Bids to Become an ‘Option’ Rather Than Just a ‘Sweetener’
Consumer usage of buy now, pay later has increased significantly over the last couple of years. Research from Auriemma Consulting Group Inc. reveals the number of debit card holders offered a BNPL option in-store or online increased more than 10 percentage points between the first quarter of 2019 and the …
Read More »June Retail Sales up 11% and other Digital Transactions News briefs from 7/8/21
U.S. retail sales increased 11% in June from June 2020, according to the latest Mastercard Inc. SpendingPulse report. They were up 10.4% compared to June 2019. E-commerce sales increased 8.3% year-over-year and were up 95% over June 2019.Payments provider Paysafe Ltd. launched a program that lets travel businesses accepting consumer payments to use a …
Read More »Splitit Adds BNPL In-Store Option and other Digital Transactions News briefs from 7/7/21
As consumers return to physical stores, Splitit USA Inc., a buy now, pay later provider, announced it is making its service available in-store and including availability with Apple Pay and Google Pay.Fly Now Pay Later, a United Kingdom-based fintech, announced a deal with Cross River Bank in New Jersey that will …
Read More »BlocPal And OneFeather Team to Deliver Services Via Mobile Wallets to Canada’s Indigenous People
As part of its goal to provide unbanked and underbanked consumers affordable digital access to financial services through a single application, BlocPal International Inc. has partnered with OneFeather, a Victoria, British Columbia-based provider of digital services to indigenous people in Canada, to introduce the OneFeather app in that country. The …
Read More »Allied in NYDIG Deal and other Digital Transactions News briefs from 7/6/21
Allied Payment Network Inc., a provider of online and mobile bill-payment services, said it will work with New York Digital Investment Group (NYDIG) institutions using Allied to offer customers the ability to buy, sell, and hold Bitcoin. Allied said it and NYDIG plan to add digital payments via Bitcoin.Reuters reported …
Read More »Small Bank, Big Influence: North American Banking Co. Joins Nacha’s Ranks of Direct Members
Every so often, evidence emerges that size is not necessarily linked to influence. Nacha, the governing body for the nation’s automated clearing house network, on Tuesday announced that North American Banking Co. has joined the ranks of direct members of the association. Direct members constitute a group of more than …
Read More »Through an Expanded Walmart MoneyCard, Green Dot Sharpens Its Focus on Banking Services
Green Dot Corp. has been steadily building its product roster in financial services for the underbanked, with the latest development emerging this week in the form of an expanded focus for the 15-year-old Walmart MoneyCard. The prepaid card, issued by Green Dot Bank and branded by Mastercard or Visa, can …
Read More »Blocked in Its Bid for Plaid, Visa Agrees to Acquire European Open-Banking Player Tink
In a deal that underscores the crucial importance of open banking in payments, Visa Inc. early Thursday said it has agreed to pay $2.15 billion to buy Tink AB, a 9-year-old, Stockholm-based company whose network connects to 3,400 financial institutions throughout Europe. The agreement comes five months after Visa abandoned …
Read More »Eye on Crypto: Fiserv Enables Crypto Transactions at FIs, And a Crypto ATM Firm Eyes 6,000 Machines
As interest grows in cryptocurrency, financial-services providers are taking note. The latest is Fiserv Inc., which announced on Thursday that financial institutions it works with will be able to allow their customers to buy, sell, and hold Bitcoin via their bank accounts. The capability is enabled via an integration between …
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