EBay Inc.’s first-quarter conference call Tuesday was as remarkable for what chief executive John Donahoe did not say as for what he did say. Asked by a stock analyst for an update on PayPal Inc.’s move into physical stores, Donahoe added little to what eBay and its PayPal unit have …
Read More »With Support from Visa And MasterCard, Host Card Emulation Lends New Momentum to NFC
A less costly, software-based way to handle mobile transactions using near-field communication (NFC) technology is expected to begin fueling NFC payments later this year following the release of specifications from both MasterCard Inc. and Visa Inc. n Support from the two major international card networks comes as demand for HCE-based …
Read More »In a Move Aimed at Aggregators And Small Sellers, Visa Tweaks FANF Fees Effective April 2015
Visa Inc. has tweaked its controversial fixed acquirer network fee (FANF), with the changes scheduled to take effect 12 months from now, according to sources who have seen the changes. A bulletin Visa released last week and circulated to acquirers indicates the modifications to the 2-year-old FANF are aimed chiefly …
Read More »End of Life for Microsoft XP Presents Opportunity for Tablet POS Vendors
With Microsoft Corp. no longer supporting its Windows XP operating system, companies marketing tablet-based point-of-sale gear and software are hoping to garner more business from small and mid-sized businesses looking to replace POS systems that use the outmoded OS. As expected, computing giant Microsoft ceased support for the 12-year-old XP …
Read More »NACHA’s New Same-Day Settlement Plan Draws Plenty of Questions From a Curious Crowd
You might call it the first stop on a long road show looming for automated clearing house network oversight body NACHA’s new proposal for same-day settlement of ACH transactions. The particular stop was a packed session at NACHA’s annual payments conference on Tuesday, where executives from financial institutions and payments …
Read More »Exposure to Card Fraud Spikes in 2013 As Shift to EMV Looms, AFP Survey Reports
Some 43% of businesses report they were exposed to card fraud in 2013, a whopping rise of 14 percentage points from 2012, according to the latest annual fraud survey from the Association of Financial Professionals. Nonetheless, survey respondents are remarkably optimistic about the Europay-MasterCard-Visa (EMV) chip card standard, with 92% …
Read More »Startup PayStand Targets Online Sellers with Bitcoin Option, Fixed Monthly Fees
Merchants that think payment services should leverage software, be simple to integrate, carry low or no fees, and include digital-currency choices have a champion in PayStand, a startup that emerged Tuesday from private beta with $1 million in funding and a promise of no transaction fees for online sellers. The …
Read More »Square Market Accepts Bitcoin As Good News/Bad News Pattern Continues for Currency
The up-and-down course Bitcoin has followed in recent months continued on Monday as Square Inc. announced it has started accepting the digital currency on Square Market, the online marketplace it unveiled last June. The news lent some legitimacy to Bitcoin just as the currency was reeling from an Internal Revenue …
Read More »Hopes for a Battered Bitcoin Buoyed by Major Merchant Announcements
Despite Bitcoin’s recent travails, the fledgling digital currency has begun to win support from some of the nation’s best-known merchants. This week came news that department-store chain Lord & Taylor will start accepting Bitcoin through a mobile app called Pounce. The news followed upbeat Bitcoin results released by online retailing …
Read More »Bowing to EMV’s Urgency, Accel Adopts MasterCard’s Common Debit Solution
Fiserv Inc. on Wednesday said its Accel debit network will license a critical EMV solution from MasterCard Inc. The move follows a decision by First Data Corp.’s Star network late last month to adopt similar technology from Visa Inc. and indicates the national-brand networks may be winning over the regional …
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