Visa Inc.’s chief executive this week questioned the drive for real-time payments by U.S. banks and merchants, but also argued Visa’s recent acquisition of business-to-business payments processor Earthport plc will help the company expand real-time payment capability beyond cardholders. Visa closed on London-based Earthport last month after winning a bidding …

Payments observers are tempted to think of the $21.5 billion proposed merger of Global Payments Inc. and Total System Services Inc. (TSYS), announced Tuesday, as the latest megadeal in a series initiated in January when Fiserv Inc. said it would acquire First Data Corp. That announcement was followed by the …

Facing major consolidation among rival processors. Global Payments Inc. and Total System Services Inc. (TSYS) made it official Tuesday they are merging in an all-stock deal that values TSYS at $21.5 billion and will leave Global with 52% of the combined entity. The acquisition is expected to close in the …

AT&T Communications said on Thursday that starting now it will accept bill payment in cryptocurrency, making it the first mobile carrier, and one of the largest companies overall, to do so. The company, a unit of AT&T Inc., is using Atlanta-based processor BitPay Inc. to handle digital-currency payments. No information …

There’s nothing like mass transit to inculcate payment habits in consumers, so it’s no surprise the major card brands are scrambling to see that their products are part of the ongoing rollout of contactless payments in the nation’s biggest transit system, New York City’s Metropolitan Transportation Authority. Starting May 31, …

Two powerful forces for making contactless cards a routine feature of daily life are acceptance by mass-transit systems and backing from the biggest issuers. On Wednesday, that combination came into focus with an announcement from Visa Inc. that starting May 31 users of the 20 million contactless credit cards JPMorgan …

With momentum building to ban cashless stores, a rough consensus seems to be emerging that the United States will never have the cashless society futurists have predicted for decades as first cards, then e-commerce, and now mobile payments took root. To be sure, research released Tuesday by Square Inc. shows …

A report that emerged over the weekend showing a first-ever drop in the ATM count in four of the five largest ATM markets has lent new urgency to the debate over whether electronic payment methods are killing cash—and hence cash dispensers. The report, from London-based RBR, says the number of …

The real-time payments network built by The Clearing House Payments Co. LLC is often viewed as a creature of the big banks, including the ones that own and control TCH, but on Friday it became clear that some of the nation’s smallest financial institutions are ready to sign up for …

Conventional wisdom in the payments business has been that the advent and spread of contactless cards would pave the way for wider use of mobile payments. But research released this week indicates that may not be the case. Indeed, far from serving as the training wheels for mobile payments, new …