VeriFone Systems Inc.’s North American revenues plunged 30% in the quarter ending Jan. 31 as small and mid-size businesses slowed purchases of VeriFone EMV chip card point-of-sale terminals. But Wall Street took it in stride, and company executives stressed new growth opportunities when they reviewed the leading U.S.-based terminal maker’s …

Acquiring processors haven’t been thought of historically as platform businesses. But the industry is changing, and processors that do it right can achieve enviable valuations. The Holy Grail for payments companies is to enjoy network effects and critical mass. Global networks such as MasterCard and Visa have both in spades. …

Ever since Ant Financial Services Group let it be known in October that it is working with key payments players like VeriFone Systems Inc. and First Data Corp. to bring its Alipay mobile-payments service to North America, the industry has wondered about the Chinese company’s strategy both in the United …

• In separate blog posts, PayPal Holdings Inc. executive vice president Bill Ready and chief executive Dan Schulman reported the company has reached 200 million total consumer, merchant, and charity accounts. They also said the PayPal’s One Touch authentication technology has signed up 50 million consumers and more than 5 million merchant accounts, …

• TouchSuite, a merchant-services company operated by American Bankcard LLC, announced it purchased Merchant Bankcard Systems of America, which has approximately 1,000 merchants in its portfolio. Terms of the deal, which closed Feb. 7, were not disclosed. • Middleware provider Datacap Systems Inc. said it completed level 3 EMV certification with …

• Payment gateway USAePay launched a browser-based EMV application the enables merchants to accept credit and debit chip card payments. • Pizza Inn has launched a rewards app offering points to customers who order through the company’s Web site. The app was developed by marketing-services firm Punchh. • Sweden-based e-commerce-payments provider Klarna said it is buying …

By John Stewart @DTPaymentNews Ever since Ant Financial Financial Services Group let it be known in October that it is working with key payments players like VeriFone Systems Inc. and First Data Corp. to bring its Alipay mobile-payments service to North America, the industry has wondered about the Chinese company’s …

• Merchant processor iPayment Inc., along with its parent company iPayment Holdings Inc., announced a refinancing with holders of its senior secured notes that company officials say should result in a “substantial deleveraging” of the company and enable it to add services and products. • Equinox Payments LLC said it supports Android Pay …

Point-of-sale terminal maker Ingenico Group is among many payments companies making announcements Monday at the National Retail Federation’s annual Big Show in New York City. France-based Ingenico says its ePayments division and its research arm Ingenico Labs now offer payment-enabled messaging bots for e-commerce merchants. Bots are an artificial intelligence …

• Payments-technology vendor Cardtek announced its Digital Enablement Platform for wearables payments. The platform relies on wearables chips from NXP Semiconductors and is aimed at integrating payment cards, transit tickets, and other services in wearable devices. Cardtek cites research from CCS Insight indicating there will be 411 million wearable devices …