The Trump administration is considering sanctions that would ban Visa Inc., Mastercard Inc., and financial institutions from handling transactions in Venezuela, according to Reuters. The move would be aimed at restricting the ability of the Venezuelan government, headed by embattled president Nicolas Maduro, to access funds. IBM Corp. may be …

Aliant Payments said it added Bob Moore Auto Group as a client for cryptocurrency processing. The agreement will allow the auto dealer to accept Bitcoin, Ethereum, and Litecoin for cars, parts, and service at its Subaru dealership in Oklahoma City. Thales S.A. said Gemalto will operate as a separate company …

Merchant acquirer EVO Payments Inc. processed 821.6 million transactions in 2018’s fourth quarter, up 16% from 705.5 million a year earlier. European transactions grew 22% to 575.1 million while North American transactions rose 5% to 246.5 million. Fourth-quarter revenues increased 9% year-over-year to $150.8 million; the company posted a net …

Mastercard Inc. said it is purchasing Ethoca Inc., a fraud-mitigation firm, for an undisclosed amount. The deal is expected to close in the second quarter. Ethoca works with more than 5,000 merchants and 4,000 financial institutions. Mastercard intends to expand Ethoca’s capabilities and combine the company with its current security …

Repay Holdings LLC said its 2018 payment volume increased 42% to $7.5 billion from $5.2 billion in 2017. Its net income increased 12% to $10.5 million from $9.4 million. Repay is in the midst of a pending merger with Thunder Bridge Acquisition Ltd. Net Element Inc. unit Unified Payments will …

Mastercard Inc. has abandoned its pursuit of cross-border specialist Earthport PLC and instead has agreed to acquire New York City-based Transfast Remittance LLC, a cross-border account-to-account money-transfer network. Terms of the deal, which is expected to close in 2019’s second half, were not disclosed. Visa Inc. last month made an …

PayActiv Inc. will use the Visa Direct platform from Visa Inc. to offer real-time deposits of earned funds to its clients’ employees. The funds can be loaded onto a Visa debit or reloadable prepaid card. PayActiv also launched its own Visa-branded general-purpose reloadable prepaid card. Testing lab Q-Card Co. said …

Payments provider Payroc LLC announced it acquired Detrok Technology Services, a developer of technology for point-of-sale, payment, and other functions in the hospitality industry. Terms were not disclosed. Payments provider Powertranz said it and NCR Corp. integrated the Powertranz software development kit and payment gateway into the NCR Aloha point-of-sale …

Fleetcor Technologies Inc., a business-to-business payments provider, said it has agreed to acquire Nvoicepay Inc., a provider of accounts-payable technology. Terms were not disclosed. Private-equity firm Napier Park Financial Partners invested $10 million in Nvoicepay in 2016. Mobile point-of-sale specialist CardFlight Inc. said its SwipeSimple product now includes the ability …

Payments company i3 Verticals Inc. announced the acquisition of two unnamed companies at a combined price of approximately $20 million. One is in the public sector and the other is in wireless Internet-service billing. Countering the impression that most users of digital-payments services skew younger, half of first-time person-to-person payment …