Mobile Commerce

Ever since the Covid pandemic set in more than a year ago, the payments industry has been abuzz with talk about its various impacts on merchant acceptance. What hasn’t received as much attention is how the pandemic has affected merchant acquiring. It turns out processors and independent sales organizations have …

American Express Co. posted second-quarter numbers Friday indicating the card giant is very nearly back to its pre-pandemic performance and reflecting a steady recovery from the travel restrictions that hampered the company for most of 2020. Driving the improved results was steady improvement in the company’s vital travel-and-entertainment business and …

The yin and yang of political, and ferociously commercial, PayPal was vividly on display with its announcement last month of a massive price hike. The e-commerce phenom attaches itself to an array of woke causes but remains a wonderfully hard-nosed commercial enterprise, keen to be fully compensated for the enormous value …

Visa Inc. has been concentrating on building out its “network-of-networks” strategy for some time, and it’s latest move in that project came early Thursday with the news that it has agreed to acquire Currency Cloud Ltd., a London-based developer of application programming interfaces that can simplify cross-border payments. The deal values …

Discover Financial Services reports its payment services volume of $78.4 billion for the second quarter of 2021 increased 22% from $64.5 billion in the same period a year ago. Its Pulse network dollar volume of $62.9 billion increased 18% from $52.9 billion year-over-year. Discover card sale volume of $45.6 billion increased …

A majority of U.S. consumers in all age groups—76%—would like to decrease their use of credit cards as they seek to avoid debt, are wary of their ability to pay off their balances each month, and have concerns about making the minimum payments, according to a survey from GoCardless Ltd., …

Payments provider Veem Inc. launched several new products for small businesses, including Veem Invoicing and Veem Collections.Cryptocurrency platform OKCoin USA Inc. has chosen FIS’s Worldpay unit to provide merchant acquiring and global exchange service in support of OKCoin’s ongoing global expansion.Visa Inc. said it will launch later this year an “evolved” brand identity featuring refreshed …

Buy now, pay later provider Sezzle Inc. launched Sezzle Capital, a program that provides working capital up to $10 million to qualified merchants. The service is built on the Wayflyer funding platform.Square Inc. launched Square Banking, based on the company’s industrial bank, Square Financial Services, which began operating in March. The banking offering consists …

Responding to consumer demand for an easier way to shop and earn rewards online, Raise Marketplace LLC announced Thursday the launch of an in-app shopping feature for its Slide mobile app. Consumers can now connect directly through the Slide app to the company’s more than 200 merchant partners to shop, …

The buy now, pay later trend has gained enough steam that the major card networks can’t afford to ignore it. The latest evidence that the credit card giants want to hedge their bets came this week with the news that Discover Financial Services invested $30 million in Minneapolis-based Sezzle Inc., …