When major technology companies started launching mobile-payments services a few years ago, many observers figured digitized and tokenized card credentials would soon replace old-fashioned plastic. But now, the chronically sluggish adoption and usage rates these mobile wallets have registered is lending new life to plastic cards. The twist is that …

South Korea-based consumer-electronics giant LG Electronics plans to bring its LG Pay mobile-payments service to the U.S. in a few months. But with its smart phones in the hands of only 10% of American consumers, how much market share LG Pay can capture and how it can distinguish itself from …

If you ask consultants what’s holding back mobile payments in the United States, you’ll get answers ranging from lack of acceptance ubiquity to malfunctions at the point of sale to consumers’ perceptions that payment cards work just fine. Now the nation’s financial institutions have weighed in on the matter, and …

Suddenly, person-to-person payments services are gaining utility beyond just paying a person via a smart phone. What gives? So you thought these newfangled person-to-person payment services were meant only to replace cash with smart-phone apps that enable individuals to send and receive money electronically? Think again. All of a sudden, …

The holiday shopping season may be coming to a close, but mashups between mobile-wallet providers, merchants, payment card networks, and card issuers are likely to continue indefinitely as all groups seek more transaction volume from consumers. Apple Inc. has been active this holiday season. In one promotion, Apple is offering …

Research firm comScore Inc. said Thanksgiving e-commerce spending on desktop devices totaled $1.57 billion, a 22% increase from last year. Black Friday spending was $2.36 billion, a 20% increase from 2016. ComScore said 115 million consumers visited online retail sites on Thanksgiving, with 61% of them only visiting using a …

Mobile payments in the United States haven’t grown as fast as program sponsors had thought they would, and now the industry is looking at what the reasons might be. After all, the payment method is positioned to consumers as a faster, easier, more secure alternative to cards, and one that …

There are plenty of opportunities for payments providers—if they play the game right, say Rick Oglesby and Brad Margol. Major retailers fear business disruption from Apple Inc., Facebook Inc., and Google/Alphabet, but they are already locked in head-to-head competition with Amazon.com Inc., and Amazon is clearly winning. It has climbed …

The Aldi Inc. supermarket chain, which only last year began accepting credit cards, said in a press release on Thursday it now “accepts all forms of contactless payment,” including Apple Inc.’s Apple Pay and Alphabet Inc.’s Android Pay mobile wallets. The Batavia, Ill.-based company has already activated contactless payments chainwide, …

Google plans soon to give merchants access to the vast trove of credit card credentials it has in its databases to speed customer checkout for mobile and online payments. The search-engine giant, however, is not putting itself in competition with payment card networks, a Google executive said this week. The …