Digital Currency

Circle Internet Financial Ltd. said early Friday it has agreed to acquire Cybavo, a Taiwan-based developer of tools for digital-asset custody and blockchain development. The Boston-based company, perhaps best known as the developer of USD Coin, a stablecoin linked to the U.S. dollar, said the acquisition will provide the technical …

Mastercard Inc. said it is working with seven companies to enable its branded payment cards to be used for making non-fungible token purchases. NFTs are digital goods.Sardine, a provider of anti-fraud and compliance technology to fintechs, said it will work with cryptocurrency-technology provider Zero Hash to enable instant settlement on the …

EMVCo reported the number of EMV chip cards in circulation globally has grown by 1.1 billion over the past year to a total of 12 billion. Some 68% of all cards issued are now EMV-enabled and 90% of all card-present transactions use EMV chip technology, according to the global standards body.Paysafe …

Total credit and debit card dollar volume for Bank of America Corp. increased 9% in May year-over-year, with credit card volume up 16% and debit volume up 9%, the Bank of America Institute reported.A research report from Aite-Novarica finds what the report calls “excessively high rates” of identity theft, which the report says …

The drive to achieve mainstream merchant acceptance of cryptocurrency received a boost Thursday as Shopify Inc. and DePay, a Swiss blockchain payments platform, teamed up to enable consumers to send direct payments to Shopify merchants’ wallets.  Shopify will leverage DePay’s blockchain to enable merchants to receive any preferred tokens, with …

Cryptocurrency-based payments platform Wirex listed a new stablecoin, NXUSD, on its platform and added support for it to its digital wallet.In related news, Asia-based crypto-investment platform Bit.Store said it is extending a partnership with crypto-based payments provider Alchemy Pay to add mobile wallets and domestic instant-transfer capabilities to Bit.Store alongside existing credit card and …

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau has sent a letter to the chief executives of JP Morgan Chase, Citibank, Bank of America, Capital One, Discover, and American Express asking them to explain the practice of omitting data about consumers’ monthly credit card payments when sending information to credit-reporting companies. The CFPB contends the …

Two of the busiest trends in payments are quick-response (QR) codes and cryptocurrency, and now payments players are finding ways to blend the two. Social Life Network Inc. on Friday said its Decentral Life unit has added a QR code application for its platform supporting digital wallets and payments. The …

Central bank digital currencies are still a relatively new payment method around the world, but now they’re starting to address the issue of user authentication, and at least one is doing it with facial-recognition technology. PopID Inc. on Thursday announced holders of the Bahamian Sand Dollar, one of the first …

Square announced its Afterpay buy now, pay later service is available to in-person point-of-sale merchants in the United States and Australia who use Square Point of Sale, Square for Retail, Square Appointments, or Square for Restaurants. In the first quarter, Square, a unit of Block Inc., said the average transaction size with Afterpay …