Endpoint The proposal would do some useful things, but that advantage is outweighed by its—and the Bureau’s—disadvantages, says Eric Grover. Rule by regulatory mandarins is not only unconstitutional, it suppresses payments competition and innovation, and consequently consumer choice and value. On Nov. 13, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau released its …

Retailer organizations are lambasting an Independent Community Bankers of America survey that blamed retailers for breach costs that totaled $90 million at The Home Depot Inc. this year. In a letter to the ICBA and bearing Monday’s date, the chief executives of the Retail Industry Leaders Association, National Retail Federation, …

Remember host card emulation? You might have lost sight of this variant of mobile payments based on near-field communication amid the flood of publicity Apple Inc.’s SIM-based Apple Pay service generated this fall. But HCE never went away, and now Royal Bank of Canada is making a bid to put …

While the payments industry waits for Apple Pay and other promising applications to help mobile catch on in in-store payments, it’s already blazing ahead in online bill pay. Some 27 million U.S. households are paying at least one bill each month on a mobile phone, according to research from banking-technology …

A U.S. House of Representatives committee released a report this week blasting the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. for its role in Operation Choke Point, a federal-government effort to deny payment-processing services to merchants intent on defrauding consumers. The report is one more nail in what appears to be a coffin …

By John Stewart While payments executives are abuzz about how mobile devices are transforming the business, they are slowly coming to realize that not all mobile users—and certainly not all mobile devices—are equal when it comes to such metrics as the average value of payments and rate of usage. The …

The Fast IDentity Online (FIDO) Alliance, a non-profit with more than 150 members in banking, payments, technology, and other industries, on Tuesday published its first standard for a better system of online authentication than the common but vulnerable user name and password. “Today, we celebrate an achievement that will define …

Gateway and e-commerce services provider Digital River Inc. on Monday joined some other payments companies that have experienced the wrath, or panic, of investors on news that their relationship with their largest customer was threatened. Shares of Minnetonka, Minn.-based Digital River plunged 22.7%, falling $5.80 to close at $19.71, after …

In the past 12 months, 51% of consumers purchased a physical good using a mobile phone, the highest percentage in five years, potentially signaling a greater propensity for consumer adoption of mobile payments, according to a new report from Javelin Strategy & Research. That’s up from 45% in 2013. In …

  The 870-page tome of proposed rules issued Nov. 13 by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau to govern prepaid cards may end up benefitting the top prepaid card issuers, says securities-rating agency Fitch Ratings. The regulations would require so-called “Know Before You Owe” disclosures and aim to improve consumers’ access to account …