Merchant cash advances for online retailers suddenly are coming into vogue with the entry of PayPal Inc. into the market. PayPal recently disclosed that it plans to test in its home country a cash-advance program similar to one it has tested in the United Kingdom. Finance companies and merchant …

  Great news for mobile payments: the Federal Reserve says the percentage of consumers using a smart phone to make a purchase at the point of sale grew nearly threefold last year. Not-so-great news: don’t rely on that figure, because it’s too small to be statistically significant. Those and other …

The Federal Trade Commission is becoming concerned that consumers who use the many emerging mobile-payments services won’t always be protected from fraud and privacy violations. In a staff report released this week entitled “Paper, Plastic or Mobile? An FTC Workshop on Mobile Payments,” the FTC lists a series of recommendations …

Mike Duffy, president and chief executive of JPMorgan Chase & Co.’s Chase Paymentech merchant-acquiring subsidiary and one of the acquiring industry’s most prominent figures, died Thursday after a long illness. “It is difficult to put into words how much Mike will be missed,” said Gordon Smith, chief executive of Chase …

George Peabody From financial institutions to card networks to mobile carriers, a fixation on payments has dimmed the once-bright prospects for near-field communication technology. Wences Casares, founder of Bling Nation and Lemon.com, once said of near-field communication, “NFC is a great technology. But it was abducted by payments, and hasn’t …

Visa Inc. is teaming up with the hot smart-phone manufacturer Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd. to kick-start the market for near-field communication (NFC) payments, and it’s also got a deal with technology provider Roam to develop mobile payments. Under an agreement with South Korea-based Samsung that Visa announced Monday, banks and …

  Fidelity National Information Services Inc. (FIS) on Monday rolled out its entry in the person-to-person payments sweepstakes and, as with other providers in recent months, its service offers real-time settlement. Indeed, People Pay—the name FIS has given its new P2P service—is built on the PayNet network the company introduced …

How banks and credit unions handle card payments from mobile devices will determine whether they remain relevant in the battle for mobile payments, says Dave Keenan. Using integrated networks, banks can create a branded mobile-payments hub to enable consumers to make payments on their own terms across all channels and …

Mobile bill payments took a step forward Thursday when automated clearing house network overseer NACHA reported that its Council for Electronic Billing and Payment (CEBP) had developed final guidelines for consumers to use Quick Response (QR) codes on bills to facilitate electronic payments. The guidelines are voluntary for billers, banks …

U.S. consumers are rapidly turning to mobile devices to pay bills, and that trend in turn is likely to encourage more card usage for bill payment and more electronic bill presentment, according to a study released this week. Some 8% of households with an Internet connection paid at least one …