Issuing/Originating

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 …

Fitbit Inc. said its smart watches and trackers with Fitbit Pay can be used to pay for transportation on seven major transit systems globally, as well as on the contactless OMNY system set for launch May 31 by the Metropolitan Transportation Authority in New York City. Multiple law firms are …

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 …

Amazon, Apple, and Microsoft each briefly enjoyed a market capitalization greater than $1 trillion. The two dominant global payment networks, Mastercard and Visa, aspire to join this august, and for the moment, memberless club. In the near term, the networks could grow on autopilot. However, inevitably diminishing retail-payments growth in …

Payments provider Nuvei announced it will buy SafeCharge International Group Ltd. for approximately $889 million. SafeCharge’s payment platform provides services ranging from card acquiring and issuing to processing and checkout. This confirms reports of a pending deal. Processor Payment Data Systems Inc. said Dealer Pay LLC, provider of a payments …

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, …

Fraud attacks involving rogue mobile applications jumped nearly 300% in the first quarter from the preceding quarter, and fraudulent card-not-present transactions rose 17%, fraud-control services provider RSA Security says in a new report. Bedford, Mass.-based RSA says it flagged 41,313 attacks from rogue apps compared with 10,390 in 2018’s fourth …

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 …

Gilbarco Veeder-Root said Citgo Petroleum Corp. released its EMV-acceptance Passport software for Citgo retailers to use in the forecourt. With this release, Gilbarco Veeder-Root said more than 70% of its Passport customers have forecourt EMV software available as upgrades. At a payments conference sponsored by The American Bankers Association, the …

Contactless payments account for only an estimated low-single-digit share of U.S. general-purchase credit and debit card transactions, but contactless has a much greater share of payments in Canada and the United Kingdom, recently released data show. Canada’s largest merchant acquirer, Toronto-based Moneris Solutions Corp., says that in the first quarter …