• Independent sales organization BluePay Processing LLC announced its purchase of the merchant-services portfolio of VersaPay Corp., a business-to-business payments provider. Terms were not disclosed. • Merchant processor Total Merchant Services introduced Groovv mPOS, a mobile point-of-sale device enabling EMV and NFC contactless payments, as well as online transactions. The device links to smart …

Counterfeiting is still the king of U.S. payment card fraud, according to the Federal Reserve’s recently released Payments Study 2016, but probably not for long thanks in part to the coming of EMV chip cards and the aftereffects of data breaches. Counterfeit fraud accounted for 44% of U.S. payment card …

By Kevin Woodward@DTPaymentNews Vantiv Inc.’s

• Merchant acquirer Square Inc. announced a promotion that waives processing costs for small businesses on more than $12,000 in Apple Pay charge volume. It will give free processing on Apple Pay transactions for small-business customers that enroll this year in a promotion that includes purchase of Square’s contactless and EMV chip card reader …

• Bloomberg reported that prepaid card services provider Green Dot Corp. is in talks to buy UniRush, a smaller competitor co-founded by Russell Simmons, the music-industry entrepreneur behind the rap label Def Jam. • In another possible deal, U.K.-based accounting and payroll software firm Sage Group plc is mulling a sale of its U.S. …

A rush of excitement is rippling through the coffee shops on K Street in downtown Washington, D.C., fueled by a once-in-eight years chance to rewrite financial regulations to protect the public without choking off financial pioneers. A lot has been written about how fractured and unresponsive the present regulations are, …

Generally, the prospects for overweening regulation and lawless intervention are dimmer, and that’s a good thing. A healthy and innovative financial-services and payments industry is vital for economic growth. Yet, for the last eight years, Washington’s boot has been on its throat. It’s been battered by the Card Act, Dodd-Frank …

The Federal Reserve’s recently released 2016 Payments Study shows that counterfeiting was the biggest type of U.S. card fraud last year. But other types of fraud, especially card-not-present fraud, are rising quickly, thanks in part to the coming of EMV chip cards and the aftereffects of data breaches. The Fed study says counterfeit fraudaccounted …

Fintech—Patti Hewitt, a.k.a. Paymentgal, observes that financial institutions need to reinvent the retail account to offer more than just the simple liquidity they’ve provided “for centuries.” She sees the bank-customer relationship itself as up for grabs. The reason is the rise of fintech, well-funded non-bank financial-services startups with deep technology …

By Danny Shader In October 2016, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. released its 2015 National Survey of Unbanked and Underbanked Households, providing valuable insight into the demographics and banking history of the unbanked and underbanked (often collectively referred to as the “financially underserved”). Many are surprised to learn that a …