PayPal Inc. will acquire the online payments gateway business of Verisign Inc. for $370 million under an agreement reached today by VeriSign and eBay Inc., Paypal's parent company. The deal, which is expected to close before year's end, also includes a multi-year agreement under which eBay will invest in VeriSign …

This week's announced integration of giant merchant acquirers Chase Merchant Services LLC and Paymentech L.P. by their respective owners (Digital Transactions News, Oct. 5) creates a single entity of unprecedented scale?more than $500 billion in annual bank card charge volume through 13 billion transactions in the U.S. and Canada?but one …

In a statement released today, Retail Decisions PLC confirmed it is seeking to buy an unnamed company “whose key activities are complementary to those of ReD.” In confirming what it called a “market rumor” about a pending transaction, the U.K.-based transaction processor and Internet payments gateway, which operates a U.S. …

Internet retailing giant Amazon.com Inc. will likely begin accepting payments cleared through the automated clearing house from at least a portion of its customer base, possibly by the end of this month, says a source familiar with the matter. This source, who asked to remain anonymous, says the move would …

Contrary to the misgivings of some retailers regarding the automated clearing house's point-of-purchase electronic check application, Wal-Mart Stores Inc. says its experience with POP has been largely positive. At the same time, however, a new fee proposed by NACHA, the rules-setting organization for the ACH, and intended to discourage unauthorized …

Nearly a year after the Check Clearing for the 21st Century Act (Check 21) took effect, sparking a steady build-up in check-image exchange volume, more exchanges are being settled on paper documents than some observers expected. The reason is that many paying banks are unprepared to settle on images and …

The legal battle over the bank card associations' interchange pricing arrangements, already red-hot, got even hotter today when four retail trade associations slapped Visa U.S.A., MasterCard International, and several major banks with a class-action antitrust suit. The suit, filed in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New …

CyberSource Corp.'s deal to acquire the assets of CardSystems Inc. would hand the Mountain View, Calif.-based transaction-gateway provider a major sales channel for both card-present and Web-based payment processing, catapulting the company squarely into the ranks of processors for small and mid-sized multi-channel merchants, according to observers. The move also …

The rising interest among banks and Internet merchants in more robust methods to verify that online customers are who they say they are is helping drive business for a form of such verification known as knowledge-based authentication. Verid Inc., a 6-year-old supplier of KBA processing services, says its transaction volume, …

Despite the vaunted efficiencies of electronic transactions, at least one regional supermarket chain has found its cost to accept PIN debit transactions is running close to its acceptance costs for paper checks. As a result, says Bryan Croteau, senior business analyst for Hannaford Bros. Co., Portland, Me.,”I don't want to …