By Jim Daly@DTPaymentNews The notion of the federal government auctioning off Bitcoin seized in drug busts and other actions looks like it’s an idea with some staying power. The U.S. Marshals Service on Monday scheduled yet another auction of the virtual currency in the wake of the four it conducted …

By John Stewart @DTPaymentNews It’s no secret the U.S. point of sale is undergoing perhaps the most extensive overhaul in its long and storied history, but now there’s evidence that a crowd of technology startups are sharing in the bounty that sweeping modernization is generating. Point-of-sale startups will likely reap …

By Kevin Woodward@DTPaymentNews Consumers using near-field communication (NFC)-enabled payment cards and smart phones enabled with mobile wallets soon will be able to use them to pay for transit rides operated by the Miami-Dade County’s Department of Transportation and Public Works, Cubic Corp. recently announced. The contract is valued at $33 …

By Jim Daly @DTPaymentNews Square Inc. reported Wednesday that its payment volume grew 42% in the second quarter to $12.5 billion, and, while still reporting a loss, the merchant processor edged toward profitability as its adjusted revenues jumped 54%. Square, which began signing merchants in 2010, also raised its financial …

By Kevin Woodward@DTPaymentNews Early Warning Services LLC announced Tuesday that both Visa Inc. and MasterCard Inc. are now part of its clearXchange peer-to-peer network. The addition of the two largest card brands means customers of participating financial institutions will be able to send money to others using a U.S.-issued debit …

By John Stewart @DTPaymentNews A relatively new program geared at shoring up data security at small merchants is making progress toward a crucial January deadline, but not without some full-throated grumbling, if comments and questions at an industry trade show this week in Grapevine, Texas, were any indication. The program, …

By Kevin Woodward@DTPaymentNews Criminals stepped up their attacks on e-commerce sites in the second quarter, producing more than 69 million rejected transactions, a stunning 90% increase from the same quarter a year ago, according to the Q2 2016 Cybercrime report recently released by ThreatMetrix. Of these transactions, 23% were payments, …

By John Stewart @DTPaymentNews Most mobile wallets in North America have struggled to win adoption and usage among consumers, and some apps backed by mobile networks have already fallen by the wayside. But one factor that could promote mobile payments is likely to come from a surprising source: restaurants. With …

If there is any certainty in today’s digital-payments arena, it’s that change is sweeping through the business at an ever-increasing pace. Just look at how the business has evolved over the past 30 years or so. In the 1980s, we were talking about the migration of debit cards from ATMs …

It might be a cliché, but the saying that the more things change, the more they stay the same has some validity for merchant acquirers despite the rapid introduction of new technologies and the entrance of new competitors in recent years. For example, the top 10 U.S. merchant acquirers in …