Digital Transactions Authoritative, insightful and timely information for payments professionals

Increasingly, merchant demands for payments capability integrated with inventory control, order management, and myriad other point-of-sale functions are forcing independent sales organizations and independent software vendors to collaborate. In this webinar, learn how and why ISOs and ISVs are working together and how this collaboration can be made to work …

Visa Inc.’s Visa Checkout online payment service now claims more than 20 million enrolled accounts, the payments giant announced Thursday. The service, which launched in July 2014, also added new merchants, among them major retailers and service companies including Wal-Mart Stores Inc. and its Sam’s Club unit, Avis Budget, and …

Yet another development has unfolded in the dueling bids for wire-transfer provider MoneyGram International Inc. As Ant Financial Services Group and Euronet Worldwide Inc. compete to acquire MoneyGram, Ant Financial on Thursday issued an open letter to MoneyGram that addresses Ant’s potential commitments to the money-transfer company. In addition to …

• Diebold Nixdorf Inc. claims to be the first ATM manufacturer to support Microsoft Corp.’s Windows 10 operating system. Microsoft will end support of Windows 7, widely used in ATMs, in January 2020. The company also introduced Essence, an ATM user interface that includes a touchscreen, an encrypted touchscreen PIN pad, …

Jamie Walker’s growth mission as the newly anointed chief executive at Elavon Inc., the acquiring arm of U.S. Bancorp, is squarely focused on e-commerce and furthering the company’s partnerships. That isn’t to set aside its other distribution channels, such as independent sales organizations or its direct-sales efforts, Walker tells Digital …

• The Western Union Co. said it has integrated Apple Pay into its mobile app, allowing U.S. customers to use the mobile-payments service to fund money transfers to more than 200 countries and territories, including domestic bill payments. More than 60% of digital-money transfers on Western Union’s network are initiated on …

While President Donald J. Trump has promised to build a wall along the southern U.S. border to stop illegal immigrants and have Mexico pay for it, an Alabama Congressman’s bill would provide financial support from people in the U.S. sending funds to Mexico and 41 other countries or territories. And …

For a company looking to grow via acquisitions, the increasing complexity of the payments business can be an advantage. That’s what Atlanta-based Avangate Inc. is banking on. On Friday, the online processor for digital goods clinched a deal to acquire 18-year-old e-commerce gateway 2Checkout.com Inc., and its appetite is hardly …

• In a bid to reach cash-only customers, Amazon.com Inc. launched Amazon Cash, a service that gives users a barcode they can store in their smart phone or print and bring to a participating store to add cash to their Amazon balance. Participating stores include CVS, Speedway, Kum & Go, and …

Nearly three-fourths of corporate treasury and finance executives say their organizations were hit by actual or attempted payment fraud in 2016, with check, automated clearing house debit, and email fraud attempts all rising, according to the Association for Financial Professionals’ ninth annual payments fraud survey. Some 74% of respondents said …

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 price of Bitcoin may have gotten hot in recent months, but investor interest in Bitcoin and blockchain startups could be cooling off. The population of unique investors pouring money into companies dealing in the cryptocurrency and its underlying infrastructure fell 27% last year to 217, according to the latest …

Netspend, the prepaid card unit of processor Total System Services Inc. (TSYS), will pay $53 million as part of a settlement it reached with the Federal Trade Commission over allegations concerning how it handled some marketing materials. The settlement, announced Friday, calls for Netspend to set aside $40 million to …

• China-based Ant Financial Services Group’s $880 million bid for wire-transfer provider MoneyGram International Inc. is generating increasing opposition in Congress on national-security grounds, according to press reports from Washington. U.S.-based Euronet Worldwide Inc. last month submitted an unsolicited $1 billion bid for MoneyGram. • Avangate, a subscription-management and e-commerce platform, announced …

Co-Op Financial Services, the big credit-union service organization based in Rancho Cucamonga, Calif., announced Monday that it had acquired Des Moines, Iowa-based payment processor TMG for $100 million. Co-Op had been the minority owner of TMG, until recently known as The Members Group, and bought out the rest of the …

The bad news about payments risk just keeps on coming. The Anti-Phishing Working Group Inc. reported last month that phishing attacks reached an all-time high in 2016, totaling 1,220,523. That was up fully 65% over 2015, the group says in its latest quarterly report. Another way to look at the …

When the nation’s automated clearing house network introduced same-day settlement in September, it was only a matter of time before an application programming interface became available to simplify faster clearing. In March, that day arrived with Dwolla Inc.’s announcement that it was commercializing a same-day ACH API. The code, which …

In the United States, contactless payments are virtually synonymous with mobile payments. In other countries, contactless payments usually mean tap-and-go transactions with a plastic debit or credit card. In the United Kingdom, for example, spending on contactless cards reached a record £3.4 billion ($4.2 billion at current exchange rates) in …

Don’t look now, but decoupled-debit programs may be on the verge of a comeback as merchants look for ways to circumvent payment networks and spur loyalty among consumers. That’s the take from a new report, “Decoupled Debit: The Start of Mainstream Adoption?” issued by Maynard, Mass.-based Mercator Advisory Group Inc. …

Lately, the Federal Reserve Board has been shepherding a cross-industry effort to build a faster, more efficient, and more secure payments system in the United States. As that commendable effort heads into its home stretch, one big question stands out glaringly, but has largely gone unaddressed: How much influence should …