Strong cardholder spending generated higher discount revenue and contributed to a 22% profit increase at American Express Co. in the third quarter. AmEx late Thursday reported that U.S. card-billed business rose 10% to $194.6 billion from $176.4 billion a year earlier. International volume rose 5% to $100.1 billion, bringing AmEx’s …
Read More »PayPal Scores an AmEx Tie-Up And Notches a Strong Quarter, Though Challenges Loom
In a reversal of its past practice, PayPal Holdings Inc. began two years ago working with competitive and semi-competitive partners, and on Thursday it added the last major U.S. card network to that list by announcing a tie-up with American Express Co. PayPal executives also disclosed the company’s performance numbers …
Read More »Visa Token Service Adds 20 Requestors And Keeps the Service Free
Visa Inc. is banking big on its Visa Token Service with the addition of 20 acquirer, gateway, and technology companies signing up to offer the network token. The card brand Wednesday announced the additions, called requestors because they request tokens for the credit and debit cards processed through their systems. …
Read More »Eye on P2P: Venmo Jacks up Its Fee for Instant Transfers; BofA Touts Zelle Results
In the hotly contested market for person-to-person transactions, PayPal Holdings Inc.’s Venmo unit has rarely made a misstep. But over the weekend the popular service said it will raise its fee from 25 cents to 1% for so-called instant transfers users make to move money from their Venmo account to …
Read More »Eye on Transactions: Strong Consumer Spending Lifts Payment Cards at Chase, Citi, and Wells
With the economy still humming along, three of the nation’s biggest banks on Friday reported healthy increases in third-quarter payment card purchase volumes. JPMorgan Chase & Co., owner of the nation’s biggest bank-run merchant acquirer, posted $343.8 billion in merchant-processing volume, a 14% increase from $301.6 billion in 2017’s third …
Read More »ATM Surcharges Rise Again, but Foreign Fees Ease
The average ATM surcharge increased this year for the 14th year in a row, but ATM foreign fees eased a bit, according to Bankrate Inc.’s latest annual study of ATM and checking account fees. New York City-based Bankrate says the average surcharge is now $3.02, up 5 cents, or 1.7%, …
Read More »With a Deadline Two Years Away, Gas Pos Launches To Aid EMV Pump And C-Store Conversions
The EMV liability shift for fuel dispensers may still be two years away, but some are not waiting to get their EMV-compliant products and services installed in convenience stores and fuel stations. Gas Pos launched a service Wednesday that puts EMV-compliant card readers in fuel dispensers and in stores, all …
Read More »COMMENTARY: How a New Ruling Sets the Stage for Surcharging in All 50 States
The national trend of merchants passing on their credit card fees continues to accelerate, aided last week by a federal court striking down Texas’s “no-surcharge” law as unconstitutional. The Texas ruling follows the defeat of no-surcharge laws in Florida and California, but it is a unique milestone: Texas is the …
Read More »In Effect Seven Years, Durbin’s Interchange Caps Still Roil the Waters of the Payments World
The debit interchange controls of the Durbin Amendment went into effect seven years ago Monday, and to mark the occasion the Electronic Payments Coalition issued its latest salvo in what appears to be a never-ending feud over that law. According to survey results released by the EPC, 52% of registered …
Read More »Qoins Debuts As Debt-Payoff Service and other Digital Transactions News briefs from 9/28/18
A new micropayment platform called Qoins has just closed a first round of funding for $1 million. The app allows users to pay off debt by rounding up purchases to the nearest dollar and sending the excess to the creditor, with a focus on credit card and student debt. Qoins …
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