Digital Transactions Authoritative, insightful and timely information for payments professionals
Blockchain start-up Lightning Labs raised $2.5 million in seed financing from investors that included Jack Dorsey, the CEO of Square Inc. and Twitter Inc., CNBC reported. Lightning Labs is developing technology that it says will make Bitcoin transactions faster and cheaper. The Square Cash app supports Bitcoin. BlockCypher, a blockchain …
March, 2018
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14 March
PCI Council Cuts Its QIR Program Fee And Shortens Training Time
The PCI Security Standards Council is making changes to its qualified integrators and resellers certification program by reducing the fee to $100, making the certification an individual one, and shortening the training-course time, the council announced Wednesday. Launched in 2012, the QIR program’s focus has been on improving payments security for …
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14 March
Who’s Afraid of Cryptocurrency? ISO Aliant Adds Ether And Litecoin to Its Bitcoin Gambit
Some experts may dismiss cryptocurrency as impractical for retail payments, but at least one independent sales organization is doubling—make that tripling—down on crypto for merchant acceptance. Fort Lauderdale, Fla.-based Aliant Payment Systems Inc. last week launched programs for Ether and Litecoin to go along with one for Bitcoin that it …
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14 March
First American Payment Systems in Apptizer Integration and other Digital Transactions News briefs from 3/14/18
Payments provider First American Payment Systems said its payment-processing services are now available to merchants using the Apptizer Order Ahead Mobile App from developer Apptizer Inc. ATM deployer Payment Alliance International said it and multicurrency payment processor Planet Payment Inc. extended a multiyear contract for dynamic currency conversion at PAI’s …
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13 March
Surcharging Is the Wave of the Future, ISO Executives Say
Not many merchants are doing it yet, but surcharging credit card transactions will soon gain more acceptance as businesses do whatever they can to reduce their card-acceptance costs. That’s the expectation of merchant-processing executives who participated in a panel Tuesday at the Southeast Acquirers Association annual conference in Orlando, Fla. …
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13 March
With Integrated Processing on the Rise, Gateways Have Become a ‘Hot M&A Target’
Independent sales organizations and acquirers looking for a payment gateway have another resource to use. Payments consultancy The Strawhecker Group recently released its Payment Gateway Directory, which catalogs 58 data points about 73 companies. The report also analyzed the performance of the gateways by assessing the account-boarding process, evaluating developer …
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13 March
A Cooling EMV Market And Slipping Chip Card Prices Show up in a Card Maker’s Results
If the payments industry needed further evidence that the EMV frenzy unleashed in the United States in 2015 is cooling off, it can find it in the fourth-quarter 2017 and full-year results posted Monday by CPI Card Group, one of the country’s chief manufacturers of chip cards. U.S. sales of …
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13 March
Fitbit’s New Smart Watch and other Digital Transactions News briefs from 3/13/18
Transaction Network Services announced its Global Wireless Access service now supports 4G roaming in more than 60 nations for use with mobile point-of-sale terminals. Fitbit Inc., maker of wearable fitness devices, released the Fitbit Versa smart watch that includes a contactless-payments capability. Payments provider i2c Inc. announced plans to open …
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12 March
Despite Challenges, Travel Companies Forge Ahead on Mobile Payments, a Report Says
More than anything else, customer demographics will drive mobile-commerce strategies for airlines, finds a study from CellPoint Mobile, a mobile-commerce vendor specializing in the travel industry. In the Miami-based company’s “Mobile Outlook 2018 Report” released last week, it found that, among airline payment professionals in the North America, 56% cited …
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12 March
Food Distributor Selects FTNI and other Digital Transactions News briefs from 3/12/18
VeriFone Systems Inc. introduced its Carbon Mobile 5, a point-of-sale device that fits in the palm of the hand and can run payment, loyalty, and inventory-management applications on the Android operating system. Financial Transmission Network Inc. (FTNI) said Merchants Foodservice, which FTNI says is the 12th-largest U.S. food-service distributor, will …
