Culling seems to be a popular practice at the two largest non-bank ATM networks these days. Both Cardtronics Inc. and financially troubled TRM Corp., which is telling investors it might not survive, lost money in the second quarter and say their U.S. ATM counts are down. TRM, which has been …

In a deal that will expand its client base of billers by 50%, Online Resources Corp. on Thursday announced it is buying Internet Transaction Solutions Inc. for $45 million in cash and stock. The Chantilly, Va.-based bill-payment processor says ITS, which processes payments for some of the country's largest collections …

Now that the two top executives have been appointed to run Visa Inc., the massive entity that will emerge from a sweeping restructuring of the worldwide Visa organization, payments observers see more capability in place to deal with issues to come. But the departure of Visa USA head John Philip …

Former First Data Corp. executive John Shlonsky, who took over this week as president and chief executive of TransFirst LLC, says he plans to lead the Dallas-based transaction processor into a wide array of new markets with backing from the company's new owner, private-equity firm Welsh, Carson, Anderson & Stowe. …

The process that led to Metavante Corp.'s pending spin-off from Milwaukee-based bank-holding company Marshall & Ilsley Corp. started two years ago as the payment processor sought ways to continue making acquisitions, according to a registration statement M&I filed this week with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The filing?775 pages in …

Private-equity financing continued to make itself felt this week in the transaction-processing business, with Blackstone Capital Partners VLP's $7.8 billion bid for Alliance Data Systems Corp. and GTCR Golder Rauner LLC's decision to sell TransFirst LLC to an even bigger investment house, Welsh, Carson, Anderson, & Stowe, for $683 million. …

Never wanting for hype, the electronic bill-payment industry may actually have something solid to crow about. Bill-pay processor CheckFree Corp. released a survey this week saying that for the first time, Internet-connected households are paying more bills electronically than by paper check. Tempering the good news for the Norcross, Ga.-based …

A letter from a major Hypercom Corp. investor to the point-of-sale terminal maker's chief executive advising a stock buyback and referring to a possible sale of the company, made public Friday in a Securities & Exchange Commission filing, has prompted rival VeriFone Holdings Inc. to target Hypercom customers with an …

10 Tipping Points for the Payments Industry Part 9 The very existence of 17,000 financial institutions in this country defies most conventional economic logic, which says efficient markets usually consolidate and concentrate around the biggest and best participants. But in the payments realm, bigger is not always better. That's why …

Leading payment processor First Data Corp. said on Thursday it would gradually exit the money-order and official-check businesses, a move some analysts see as a landmark in the growth of prepaid cards and electronic bill payment by consumers lacking traditional bank accounts. “Money orders are in big trouble,” says research …