Transaction Processing

• Apple Inc., in its results for the second quarter ending April 1, said Apple Pay is available now in 15 markets, having launched in Taiwan and Ireland in March. Globally, that includes 20 million contactless-ready locations, of which 4.5 million are in the United States, said chief executive Tim Cook during …

In-store shopping isn’t going anywhere. That’s the finding of a survey from online processor Adyen. That’s especially true for pre- and post-purchase needs. And it’s just one sign of how much more demanding consumers are becoming when it comes to payments and related transactions. Eighty-six percent of consumers want to …

Mastercard Inc. reported Tuesday that it switched nearly 17% more transactions in the first quarter than it did a year earlier. Most of the growth came from overseas, but some of it resulted from more U.S. PIN-debit volume, company executives said. Purchase, N.Y.-based Mastercard said it switched 14.7 billion transactions …

• Processing giant First Data Corp. and cross-border payments specialist Flywire Corp. announced a collaboration by which Flywire education and health-care clients will be able to more easily accept cross-border card payments and First Data clients will be able to more readily accept high-value international remittances. • Gro Solutions, a vendor of digital solutions …

The global chip card standard known as EMV became a reality for U.S merchants, acquirers, and issuers in October 2015. That’s when the liability for counterfeit card transactions at the point of sale shifted, by network rules, from issuers to merchants if the merchants weren’t prepared to accept EMV cards. …

Consulting firm The Strawhecker Group is out with its 2016 rankings of U.S. merchant acquirers, and they show that 240 acquirers and independent sales organizations processed more than $5 trillion in payment volume. The 10 biggest acquirers accounted for 80% of that volume. Topping the list is JPMorgan Chase & …

The subject of faster payments has been in the news almost continually for months now, but apparently awareness of the subject, and in some cases adoption, remains lower than expected among the financial institutions that will be depended on to implement speedier settlement. That’s if survey results released in April …

With a forecast of 15 billion new devices as part of the Internet of Things potentially coming online as payments devices by 2021, securing these devices, whether they are cars, wearables, or appliances, is emerging as a top concern. “We are seeing a huge increase in inadequately protected devices,” Graeme …

“What?!” That’s the mildest reaction I get from my clients when I dispense the advice encapsulated in the title of this month’s column. “A password I remember I don’t need to write down, so it cannot be pilfered,” says the incredulous client. “Not so,” I reply, and people are not …

If you want to see a rowdy debate, try gathering a group of colleagues and posing the question of whether or not fintech companies should be regulated. In posing this question to several groups of payments professionals, I have observed that the same arguments, pro and con, keep coming up. …