News

November, 2012

• 8 November

  Starbucks Debuts ‘Square Lite’ in 7,000 Stores, But More Features Are Coming

  Three months after announcing their partnership, mobile-payments provider Square Inc. and coffee king Starbucks Corp. said Starbucks customers could now use the Square Wallet for purchases at 7,000 company-operated U.S. locations. The purchase process at Starbucks will be a bit different for users of the consumer-facing Square Wallet, formerly known …
• 7 November

  Holding Patents on Mobile Acceptance, a Small Firm Won’t Rule out ‘Legal Remedies’

  With a pair of U.S patents in hand, a small, Montreal-based engineering firm may have placed itself in a position to strongly influence the fast-growing market for mobile card acceptance. The patents, awarded last month to AnywhereCommerce, cover payments via a dongle connected to a mobile device’s audio jack, a …
• 6 November

  First Data: Planned Settlement Would Let the Card Networks ‘Buy a License to Monopolize’

  With a hearing coming up on Friday, objections to the proposed credit card interchange settlement are piling up in Brooklyn, N.Y., faster than debris from Superstorm Sandy. In addition to a number of retailers and their trade groups, those on record against the controversial plan forged by lawyers for the …
• 5 November

  Small Merchants Show No Improvement in Card-Data Security, Survey Says

  For years, the payments industry has hoped to see improvement in card-data security among small merchants in the U.S. But, according to a survey released last week, it’s not happening. Indeed, in some important measures, there has been backsliding on security among the nation’s smallest retailers. A little more than …
• 5 November

  What’s in Google’s Wallet? Possibly a Discover Card

  Discover Financial Services is about to team up with Google Inc. to bring the Google Wallet to the physical point of sale with a Discover-branded plastic card, according to the latest rumor sweeping Silicon Valley. Discover recently began issuing cards for PayPal Inc., so if the Google rumor proves true, …
• 1 November

  Visa Reports Growth in Credit, Less Bleeding in Debit, Progress for Its V.me Wallet

  Visa Inc. on Wednesday reported brisk growth in its credit business and a stabilizing debit market while touting progress for its new digital wallet, V.me. Overall, the results released for Visa’s fourth quarter show the world’s biggest payments network is wising up about how to cope with a new, more …

October, 2012

• 31 October

  Acquiring Giant Vantiv Agrees to Buy Litle & Co. for $361 Million

  In a move that will greatly expand its business in card-not-present transaction processing, merchant processor Vantiv Inc. announced on Wednesday that it has agreed to acquire Lowell, Mass.-based Litle & Co. for $361 million in cash. The transaction is expected to close later this year and will result in 11-year-old …
• 31 October

  MasterCard Reports Debit Up, Credit Growth So-So, And a Tie-Up with Square

  New PIN-debit business as a result of the Durbin Amendment continued to lift MasterCard Inc.’s transaction volume in the third quarter, though the No. 2 card network’s top executives warned on Wednesday that the big growth is likely to slow down. Meanwhile, MasterCard is turning its attention to juicing up …
• 30 October

  Mobile-Payments Pioneer Obopay Puts Itself on the Block As Wallet Trend Heats up

  Obopay Inc., a pioneer in mobile payments whose profile fell as mobile wallets gained momentum, has put itself up for sale, according to sources familiar with the matter. Details about the sale remain sketchy, including possible valuations and the identity of bidders, but sources say the 7-year-old company and its …
• 30 October

  A Parking Processor Gets into a Political Fender-Bender with Sen. Durbin

  A 13-cent fee increase from Parkmobile USA Inc., a specialty payments processor for parking providers and municipalities, drew heavy fire last week from U.S. Sen. Richard Durbin, chief sponsor of the Durbin Amendment in 2010’s Dodd-Frank Act that imposed price controls on most debit card transactions. The brouhaha is the …