Digital Transactions Authoritative, insightful and timely information for payments professionals

Corporations and wealthy consumers have a new option when they need to move funds internationally. HiFX, a unit of Euronet Worldwide Inc., has begun offering its services to U.S. and Canadian clients. Acquired by Leawood, Kan.-based Euronet in 2014, U.K.-based HiFX enables users to transfer funds internationally in 28 currencies, …

For e-commerce merchants, the screen is getting smaller very quickly, according to the latest quarterly report from payments company Adyen. Some 17.5% of all e-commerce transactions on Adyen’s platform in the fourth quarter were made with a smart phone, compared to 16% with a tablet, the Netherlands-based company said late …

In response to pleas from merchant acquirers, Visa Inc. this month modified a deadline in its program to get small merchants into compliance with the Payment Card Industry data-security standard, a program the leading payment card network announced to acquirers in October. The change affects the usage of qualified integrators …

Payments-technology provider ACI Worldwide Inc. said it plans to sell its Community Financial Services (CFS) unit to bank processor Fiserv Inc. for $200 million in cash. CFS, which provides online and mobile banking and payments and security services to community banks and credit unions, generated about 22% of ACI’s $1.02 …

In 2015, American Express Co. had a bad year. Hit hard by competitive pressures on merchant fees and cobrand-card returns, as well as swooning gasoline prices, the big card network on Thursday reported a 4% decline in revenue net of interest expense for the year to $32.8 billion, its first …

Starbucks Corp. keeps adding digital caffeine to its mobile-payments and loyalty offerings built around a prepaid card. The Seattle-based coffee king on Thursday reported that 21% of its U.S. transactions were paid on the Starbucks mobile app in the quarter ended Dec. 27, up from 20% in the previous quarter …

It’s often neglected in the payments business, but one of the fastest-growing markets is processing cross-border transactions for college and post-graduate students studying abroad. The business is dominated by wire transfers, but a startup called Flywire, which has served the market for more than four years, is enjoying fast growth. …

E-commerce merchants and the payments companies providing them with merchant services have reason to be both happy and disappointed with the 2015 holiday season. On the one hand, merchants handled the voluminous number of e-commerce orders by using their physical stores to fulfill their online sales. The volume of these …

Subscription payments, also known as recurring billing, is getting renewed attention in the payments industry from companies that provide direct-to-consumer services merchants use, like Recurly Inc., and some providing merchant services, like Fattmerchant Inc. Merchants selling goods and services paid for with subscription payments likely had a busy Cyber Monday …

While consumer acceptance of mobile wallets has been painfully slow for wallet developers such as Apple Inc., new survey results from the nation’s largest mobile carrier show consumers are quite willing to use mobile apps in some form to buy things. Some 23% of smart-phone owners last year used an …

With the National Retail Federation’s annual trade show kicking off Monday in New York City, a number of payments companies tried to get a head start on the show by releasing news over the weekend. Much of it concerns developments for the physical point of sale. Here’s a wrap-up of …

As the payments industry contends with ongoing state and federal regulatory inquiries, the Electronic Transactions Association will release an updated version of its “Guidelines on Merchant and ISO Underwriting and Risk Monitoring” in February. The final edits are being made, says Deana Rich, principal of Deana Rich Consulting Inc., which …

First Data Corp. on Friday said it is joining the market for card readers that plug into mobile phones. Its latest entry in its Clover line of point-of-sale technology is Clover Go, a credit and debit card reader that connects to smart phones and tablets via the mobile device’s headphone …

In this age of mobile payments, online commerce, and millions of places to use plastic payment cards, cash remains highly relevant and popular with consumers, the nation’s leading retailer ATM network insists. Houston-based Cardtronics Inc. on Thursday released results of a survey showing that consumers use cash far more than …

E-commerce processor Adyen Inc. announced on Thursday it is now offering payments capability for physical stores in the United States, a move that follows the company’s success in providing a payments gateway for a number of prominent digital clients, including Facebook, Uber, Airbnb, and Netflix. Also on Thursday, ATM maker …

Samsung Pay, the mobile wallet that uses near-field communication (NFC) and magnetic secure transmission (MST) technology, is developing a set of simple tools merchants can use to create offers and manage loyalty programs. The tools should be available this year. That’s the word from Will Graylin, global co-general manager of …

Sweden’s online-payments firm Klarna started operations in the United States only four months ago, but already it is making itself felt in the highly competitive business of serving U.S. e-commerce merchants. Nearly 20 retailers have signed up for the company’s streamlined checkout service, including big sellers Overstock.com and Shoes.com. That’s …

Toronto-based loyalty-services and payments start-up nanoPay Corp. has acquired the MintChip digital-currency platform from the Royal Canadian Mint, the organizations announced Tuesday. The purchase price wasn’t disclosed, but nanoPay says it could be revealed at a later date. MintChip gained fame in 2012, just as Bitcoin and other virtual currencies …

Consumers using mobile-banking sites or apps make only sporadic use of their ability to pay bills, send money to other individuals, or load a prepaid card, finds new research from Javelin LLC, a Pleasanton, Calif.-based payments-research firm. In the “2015 Mobile Banking, Smartphone, and Tablet Forecast” released Tuesday, Javelin found …

The more than 72,000 students and faculty members of Arizona State University have a new app to help them find deals from local merchants. Dubbed ASU Deals, the app, available for iOS and Android mobile devices, enables users to search for local deals and receive notifications from merchants. Developed by …