Law and Regulation

• Attorneys general from 18 states and the District of Columbia sent a letter this week to Congressional leaders urging them to oppose three pending joint resolutions that would overturn the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s controversial prepaid account rule. Consumer groups generally favor the rule, but business interests and many Republicans …

While President Donald J. Trump has promised to build a wall along the southern U.S. border to stop illegal immigrants and have Mexico pay for it, an Alabama Congressman’s bill would provide financial support from people in the U.S. sending funds to Mexico and 41 other countries or territories. And …

Netspend, the prepaid card unit of processor Total System Services Inc. (TSYS), will pay $53 million as part of a settlement it reached with the Federal Trade Commission over allegations concerning how it handled some marketing materials. The settlement, announced Friday, calls for Netspend to set aside $40 million to …

Merchants won a skirmish on Wednesday in their long-simmering battle with the card networks over acceptance costs with a decision by the U.S. Supreme Court to void a lower-court ruling that upheld a state law banning credit card surcharging. The decision, in which all eight Justices concurred, sends the case …

The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday heightened the uncertainty surrounding crucial payment card rules and practices by refusing to hear an appeal of a lower-court decision last summer that threw out a $5.7 billion antitrust settlement. The top court’s decision will likely lead to years of continuing litigation and negotiation, …

This article is the first installment of a three-part series this week on what the Federal Reserve’s Faster Payment Initiative means to the payment economy in the U.S., and how the payments ecosystem might get to “yes” on fixing what’s broken and deploying what’s possible. This part deals with the …

The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency has provided additional details about evaluating applications for its proposed limited-purpose national bank charter for financial-technology companies, but voices critical of the charter are growing louder. The OCC, a unit of the U.S. Treasury Department that regulates national banks, first proposed the …

Facing a Congressional effort to overturn its recently released prepaid rule, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau on Wednesday issued a proposal to delay the rule’s effective date by six months. In the 16-page proposal, the agency suggests moving the effective date from Oct. 1 of this year to April 1, …

E-commerce platform provider Shopify Inc. is facing pressure to cut ties with a controversial client, the Breitbart alt-right online news site. On Thursday, activist groups plan to present a petition with 140,000 signatures at Shopify’s Ottawa, Ontario, headquarters, demanding that the processor cut off Breitbart as a client. The news …

By Kevin Woodward@DTPaymentNews As the U.S. Supreme Court gets nearer to considering the 2012 interchange settlement, the National Retail Federation and the Retail Industry Leaders Association asked the court to let stand an settlement. The trade groups, which for the most part represent large retailers, argue, in part, that the …