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  NCR Corp. bolstered its position at the point of sale this week by announcing a deal to buy Radiant Systems Inc. for $1.2 billion in cash. Alpharetta, Ga.-based Radiant Systems is a specialist in POS software and hardware for various merchant segments, especially the hospitality industry and specialty retailers. …

  While point-of-sale payments using near-field communication (NFC) technology appear to be drawing closer, systems that let consumers make mobile payments in stores without NFC are drawing investor interest. This week, Mobibucks, a Louisville, Ky.-based startup, announced a $5 million Series A funding round led by Acadia Woods Partners. The …

  Barring any dramatic departures from script by the Federal Reserve, which is charged with writing the regulations to implement the Durbin Amendment, it now appears that law’s stringent limits on debit card interchange will go into effect more or less on schedule, perhaps this month. The banks’ last hope …

  Keeping a Wary Eye on the Networks   Forget about Google and PayPal. Merchant acquirers are more worried about competitive threats from their long-time spouses by forced marriage, the payment card networks.   That intelligence comes from an Aite Group LLC survey of 20 industry executives, including 17 chief …

  Karen Epper Hoffman   The recession and the shaky recovery have taken their toll on acquiring, though the business has fared better than most other industries. Now, the business could be set to soar—if factors like Durbin don’t choke off growth.   In an economy where even the strongest …

  Peter Lucas   Keeping up with change in electronic payments is hard, but essential, work for community banks. Here’s how they’re doing it.   Every time a huge bank—Bank of America Corp., JP Morgan Chase & Co., and Wells Fargo & Co., for example—makes a splash in payments, as …

n by Steve Mott   While most observers have viewed Visa’s recent string of acquisitions as a mere broadening of its conventional card franchise, a long-time analyst of the payments business sees a clever play for dominance of the digital future.   Just when the U.S. payments industry appears poised …

  Purveyors of card-acceptance services for mobile phones  are booking merchants by the hundreds of thousands.  But many of these merchants present underwriting risks and generate little charge volume. Are they worth it?   By Jim Daly   Everyman a merchant? Thanks to smart phones and aggressive merchant processors such …

  The PCI Security Standards Council on Friday released its first guidelines on mobile-acceptance applications since announcing in November that it had stopped reviewing such products. The Wakefield, Mass.-based Council, which manages the Payment Card Industry data-security standard (PCI), also said it hopes to start forming a broad group of …