Issuing/Originating

The Fed has amassed enormous—in practice, unaccountable—power, and taken roles natural to government and to the private sector. It’s the central bank, paramount financial-system regulator, and a payments operator. It shouldn’t, however, undertake activities better and naturally performed in the private sphere.  The latest example: On its own prerogative, the …

Policymakers have much work ahead when reviewing cryptocurrencies like the proposed Libra, a European regulator said Wednesday. In related news, a cryptocurrency payment plugin debuts for WordPress. The Libra cryptocurrency project led by Facebook Inc. has “undoubtedly been a wake-up call for central banks and policymakers,” said Benoit Coeure, a …

American Express Co. posted an online guide for consumers about contactless cards. Beginning in July of 2019, all newly issued AmEx consumer and small-business cards are contactless-enabled, and starting next month all newly issued corporate cards will be contactless-enabled.P97 Networks, a provider of mobile payments and rewards programs for petroleum retailers, …

More types of retailers and e-commerce merchants are facing more fraud attempts as the number of attacks increased for every merchant type covered in the 2019 True Cost of Fraud report issued Tuesday by LexisNexis Risk Solutions. And with the growth comes an increase in the cost to counter the …

The United Kingdom’s Competition and Markets Authority fined PayPal Holdings Inc. £250,000 ($309,700) in connection with PayPal’s $2.2 billion acquisition of Sweden-based processor iZettle AB last year; the regulator said PayPal violated an order not to integrate its U.K. business with iZettle during an investigation by cross-selling services to U.K. consumers. PayPal said it …

The Federal Trade Commission announced settlements with the two principals of Apex Capital Group, an Internet marketer of dietary supplements and personal-care products the FTC accused of using deceptive free-trial offers and negative-option billing in the U.S. and United Kingdom. The defendants must surrender assets valued at $3 million or more and are barred …

The General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) became enforceable on May 28, 2018, in the European Union (EU). Now, almost a year and a half later, things seem to be getting a bit more real as companies like British Airways and Marriott International are being hit with substantial fines and the Information …

The warmth of late summer still bathes much of the country, but PayPal Holdings Inc. already has its eyes on the upcoming holiday spending season. The online commerce leader today unveiled a zero-interest financing promotion for its PayPal Credit service with a lowered purchase threshold. In addition to charging no …

Digital payments, combined with competition from nonbanks in payments, may cost banks as much as 15% of their global payments revenue, or $280 billion, says Accenture in its “2019 Global Payments Survey.” Released Monday, the survey of 240 retail and corporate payments executives across multiple countries suggests that global-payments revenue …

Turnkey Risk Solutions, a risk-management firm specializing in first-party fraud, rebranded as Humaitrix LLC. Payments veterans John J. Leehy III joined the company as chief executive and Gregory W. Sahrmann joined as the chief operating officer. Amy Walraven, a former JPMorgan Chase & Co. risk executive, is founder, president, and chief …