Processor First Data Corp. completed its previously announced, $760 million acquisition of independent sales organization BluePay Holdings Inc.  Payment-services provider Shift4 Corp. announced its EMV-certified services are now available to users of Posera Ltd.’s Maitre’D point-of-sale hospitality software. Infinite Peripherals launched the InfineaRetail Airline Edition point-of-sale suite of products. Mastercard …

So far, nobody is making any money betting on Bitcoin to crash. The digital currency on Sunday soared past the $9,000 mark just five days after hitting $8,000 for the first time, and the $10,000 level could be in sight as early as later Monday, according to Coindesk, an online …

Despite all the talk about mobile payments, online payments, cryptocurrencies, and EMV chip cards, the alternatives to cash still haven’t killed their sworn enemy. In fact, between 2006 and 2016, the growth of currency in circulation matched or exceeded growth in gross domestic product in 40 of 42 nations examined …

Bitcoin keeps rising to new heights, though in fits and starts. The world’s leading cryptocurrency leapt to yet another record high on Sunday to breach the $8,000 level for the first time, sank several hundred dollars on Monday, then sprang back overnight. By Tuesday morning, it was trading above $8,300, …

Private-label card issuer Synchrony Financial and PayPal Holdings Inc. have expanded their credit agreements. Announced Wednesday, the deal sees Stamford, Conn.-based Synchrony Financial become the exclusive provider for PayPal Credit, the payment company’s U.S. online consumer financial program, and extends an existing co-branded consumer credit card issued by Synchrony Financial, …

Backers of the so-called SegWit2x proposal to double block size for Bitcoin suspended the effort on Wednesday, citing a lack of “consensus for a clean blocksize upgrade.” The move, which would have occurred around Nov. 16, was an effort to increase transaction capacity for Bitcoin and relieve upward pressure on …

Apple Pay users have more than doubled over the past 12 months, Apple Inc. reported, without citing a specific number. Yearly transactions have increased 330%, and more than 5 million U.S. merchant locations will be accepting the mobile-payment service by the end of the year, the company said during an …

Mobile point-of-sale provider CardFlight said payment processor Beyond will offer CardFlight’s SwipeSimple device to merchants. The technology enables EMV chip card transactions from a mobile device. CME Group, a major derivatives marketplace, announced plans to launch a futures market for Bitcoin before the end of the year, pending regulatory review. On …

The current wave of buying and selling is the right prescription at the right time for a business that badly needed shaking up, says O.B. Rawls. For decades, the payments industry was pretty stagnant, but over the past decade, and even more so recently, that has changed drastically. Now part …

Our daunting set of sticky wickets this time ranges from data breaches that just don’t stop to debit card pitfalls to travails for P2P and Bitcoin. This is Digital Transactions magazine’s 11th annual ranking of payments woes, and one lesson we’ve learned in all that time is that they don’t …