The U.S. Secret Service began warning financial institutions last week about ATM “jackpotting,” in which a machine quickly spits out huge amounts of cash after being physically compromised by organized gangs and infected with a variant of malware first seen in 2013, according to KrebsOnSecurity. Hackers are especially targeting Diebold …
Read More »The Democratization of Bitcoin: An ATM Network Appeals to Average Joes
Bitcoin may have slipped from the near $20,000 price it commanded a little over a month ago, but it’s still selling for around $11,000, nearly a dozen times its value a year ago. That’s drawing in plenty of investors and other high rollers, but it’s also attracting average citizens, including …
Read More »Cardless ATM Use Advances With Bank’s Deployment of Mastercard’s Cash Pick-Up Service
The evolution of ATMs away from strictly card-based usage and toward mobile devices advanced Thursday when Fort Lee, N.J.-based Cross River Bank reported that it is the first bank to offer Mastercard Inc.’s Cash Pick-Up service. The service, which Mastercard announced in September, enables so-called underbanked or unbanked consumers to …
Read More »Not Dead Yet: Growth in Cash Outpaces GDP Growth in Many Countries
Despite all the talk about mobile payments, online payments, cryptocurrencies, and EMV chip cards, the alternatives to cash still haven’t killed their sworn enemy. In fact, between 2006 and 2016, the growth of currency in circulation matched or exceeded growth in gross domestic product in 40 of 42 nations examined …
Read More »Gone With the Wind: Hurricanes Blow a Hole in a Puerto Rican Processor’s Volumes
Hurricanes Irma and especially Maria devastated Puerto Rico-based payment processor Evertec Inc.’s business in September, and the company’s merchant business is in for a long recovery as the island struggles to restore electric power and other essential services to businesses and residences. In reviewing Evertec’s third-quarter results during a Tuesday …
Read More »Cardtronics Shows Resiliency Despite ‘an Incredible Streak of Bad Luck’
A strong third-quarter earnings report helped lift shares of ATM network owner and operator Cardtronics plc by 4% Friday morning after they plunged 17% Thursday on news that Link, the ATM network in the United Kingdom—a key market for Cardtronics—floated a proposal to reduce interchange by 20%. Cardtronics, which has …
Read More »First Data Buying BluePay and Other Digital Transactions News briefs from 10/20/17
First Data Corp. made it official: it is acquiring merchant processor BluePay Holdings Inc. for $760 million in cash. BluePay processes $19 billion annually for 77,000 merchants and is integrated into more than 450 software platforms. The deal is expected to close by the end of the year. First Data inadvertently …
Read More »CPI Receives Card Patents and other Digital Transactions News briefs from 10/18/17
For U.S. Bancorp’s Elavon unit, merchant-processing revenues were down slightly in the third quarter, to $405 million, compared to a year ago, according to the bank’s earnings release. But revenue year to date is up 0.2%, at $1.19 billion, compared to the same period in 2016. Payment card manufacturer CPI …
Read More »As Out-of-Network ATM Fees Climb to an All-Time High, Cash Gets More Expensive
In the age of electronic payments, cash is getting more and more expensive—even when accessed via electronic means. Nationwide, it costs consumers $4.69 to withdraw money from a so-called out-of-network ATM. That’s up 2.6% from a year ago, according to the latest data from Bankrate Inc., a New York City-based …
Read More »Operation Choke Point Officially Is Dead, but an ATM Trade Group Believes Its Ghost Lingers
It was just over a month ago that a ranking U.S. Department of Justice official told Congress that Operation Choke Point had ended. But the ATM Industry Association on Wednesday said it is distributing materials to its members to help them deal with the “lingering impact” of the controversial program. …
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