June, 2019

• 1 June

  Don’t Get Swamped by the POS Credit Wave

  

  Fast, frictionless credit at the point of purchase, delivered via mobile apps, threatens to sideline banks. It won’t—if they look upon new fintechs as friends rather than foes. We increasingly use smart phones to make contactless payments and apps to collect rewards. And now, we use new and fast-growing short-term …

May, 2019

• 1 May

  A Year of Opportunity for Retail Petroleum

  

  Independent gas stations will have their hands full with the shift to EMV, but there are ways to mitigate the pain. And ISOs can help. Things are looking up for U.S. gas stations. In 2018, vehicle registrations hit 276 million—up 6 million from 2017. And that number is set to …

April, 2019

• 1 April

  Why It Makes Sense for Fiserv to Buy First Data

  

  Few foresaw this combination, but the deal is far from baffling once you understand Fiserv’s history and long-term strategy. Every so often, a deal comes along that makes the market take notice. One such moment was the announcement in January of the Fiserv Inc.-First Data Corp. multibillion-dollar acquisition/merger. Essentially, the …

March, 2019

• 1 March

  PayPal: Secrets of a Relentlessly Relevant Juggernaut

  

  Staying on top in payments requires close attention to a few ironclad rules, say Saurabh Wahi and Davis Ward. In the fourth annual Prophet Brand Relevance Index (BRI), PayPal Holdings Inc. was once again, and by far, the best-performing financial-services brand. It’s not just that it continues to outperform such …

January, 2019

• 31 January

  The Fundamentals Still Apply

  

  Want to start—or bet on—the next big thing in payments? Forget glitz and glamor and focus on startups that address pressing problems with substantial and realistic solutions, argues Eric Grover. Successful payments fintechs such as Adyen, Ant Financial, Klarna, Stripe, and Square have generated enormous excitement. With the arguable exception …
• 1 January

  It’s Past Time To Hire—And Promote— More Women

  

  Too many companies are still ignoring the talents women can bring to senior roles in finance, technology, and other areas, says Karla Friede. We need more women leaders in technology companies. Having personally experienced gender bias during my career, it’s hard for me to say this because the last thing …

December, 2018

• 1 December

  Balancing Consumer Expectations And Fraud Prevention

  

  There are no perfect solutions for account-takeover fraud, but tactics such as consumer education and prevention at log-in can make a big difference, says Rich Huffman. According to Javelin Strategy & Research’s report entitled, “2018 Identity Fraud: Fraud Enters a New Era of Complexity,” account takeovers (ATOs) tripled in 2017, …

November, 2018

• 1 November

  Contactless Cards in America— When, Oh When, Will They Appear?

  

  The United States is way behind other markets in adopting tap-and-go cards. That’s about to change. Thad Peterson explains why. The main benefit of EMV implementation is the virtual elimination of card-present counterfeit card fraud, and that alone is worth EMV’s massive infrastructure investment. But there’s another benefit to new …

September, 2018

• 30 September

  The Far-Reaching Impact of Same-Day ACH, One Year After Launch

  

  Competition from faster payments pushed the automated clearing house to introduce same-day processing, but now the ACH may well turn the tables, says Sarah Grotta. It has been a year since same-day ACH (SDA) credits and debits have been available in the United States. Here’s a quick refresher of SDA …
• 2 September

  The Blockchain Is Taking Pragmatic Steps Toward Being More Than Hype

  

  Distributed ledgers are slowly but steadily working their way into mainstream financial applications. That means the time has come to understand how blockchain works—and to take the technology more seriously, says Esther Pigg. Despite all the hype surrounding it, blockchain—or “distributed-ledger technology” (DLT)—remains a complicated mystery to many. Here is …