A leading payments industry news source for more than 17 years. Glenbrook curates the news and keeps you abreast of the important daily headlines in payments.
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January 26, 2023
On the web
Crypto-Friendly Stripe Weighs Public Offering: Report
Cointelegraph
Internet payment processor Stripe is reportedly eyeing a public offering and has set a 12-month timeline to explore the possibility. Stripe has hired Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan Chase to advise on the feasibility and timing of a public-market debut, according to a Jan. 26 report by The Wall Street Journal. A source with knowledge of the matter told the Journal that Stripe's executives will either take the company public or allow employees to sell shares in a private transaction.
Is Once-Yearly Pen Testing Enough for Your Organization?
The Hacker News
ny organization that handles sensitive data must be diligent in its security efforts, which include regular pen testing. Even a small data breach can result in significant damage to an organization's reputation and bottom line. There are two main reasons why regular pen testing is necessary for secure web application development:...
Biometric Payment Cards Launched by G+D, Demoed by STMicroelectronics
Biometric Update
The new biometric payment card from Giesecke+Devrient has been launched under the brand name ‘Convego YOU.’ Benefits to issuers include a compelling new offering for high-value customers, an enjoyable user experience, inherently secure authentication, robust onboarding and G+D extensive experience as a partner, according to a company announcement.
On the wires
Ubirider and Mastercard Partner to Provide Mobility-as-a-Service Solutions for Transit Operators Globally
PR Newswire
Mastercard and Ubirider, Portugal-based makers of the mobility-as-a-service (MaaS) platform Pick designed to serve riders, transport operators and cities, have entered into an agreement to jointly offer Innovative digital solutions that combine operational, payment and ticketing resources and data for public transport agencies and operators. Through this partnership, Mastercard and Ubirider will look to expand on the early success of the products in Portugal to simplify access and payments for mobility services.
Wise Enters 2023 With 15 New Partners in 4 New Markets, Bringing Total to Over 60 Partners Worldwide
Businesswire
Wise, the global technology company building the best way to move money around the world, launched 15 new partnerships in 2022 and enters 2023 with a total of 60 partners globally. These partnerships are made possible through Wise Platform, which allows banks and businesses to embed the power of Wise into their existing platform. Almost 10 million new customers gained access to Wise, via Wise Platform, in 2022 alone.
January 25, 2023
On the web
Mastercard and ZoodPay Join Forces to Launch the First Virtual Installment Card Across EEMEA
ZoodPay
ZoodPay, a leading digital lending platform for e-commerce in the Middle East and Central Asia, has entered into a strategic partnership with Mastercard to launch the first-of-its-kind prepaid virtual installment card in the Eastern Europe, Middle East, and Africa (EEMEA) region. This collaboration will expand financial and digital inclusion, benefiting the underbanked population and those with no credit data or limited access to finance.
U.S. Payments Forum Announces 2023 Steering Committee
U.S. Payments Forum
The U.S. Payments Forum today announces its 2023 Steering Committee and Officers. The group serves as a leadership organization within the Forum, essential in enabling efficient, timely and effective implementation of emerging and existing payment technologies in the U.S. market and beyond. The group is comprised of payments leaders representing top global and domestic payment networks, merchants, issuers, acquirers and industry suppliers. The following members have been elected as Steering Committee officers for 2023...
Bold Commerce Integrates PayPal Bringing Payments and Commerce Together
Bold Commerce
Bold Commerce, the ecommerce technology company that powers checkout and subscription experiences for leading retailers and DTC brands, today announced a new integration with PayPal, the financial technology company that empowers consumers and merchants to join and thrive in the global economy with its payments and commerce platform. PayPal is working with Bold Commerce to bring payments and commerce together as the fintech company moves into the growing headless commerce market.
Clik2pay Announces Bank Payments for Shopify Stores
Clik2pay
Payment service provider Clik2pay announced it has developed an industry changing application which allows any Shopify store to seamlessly offer a direct-from-account payment option to customers. When using Clik2pay, payments are completed safely and securely using Interac e-Transfer™, one of the most trusted money transfer systems in the world.
Klarna Introduces Money Story: A Personal Overview of Your Spending in 2022
Klarna
Klarna, the global leader in the generational shift away from credit cards, today announced the launch of Money Story in the US Klarna App - a personal spending summary of 2022 that provides millions of consumers with useful insights into their spending habits and helps them be informed and in control of their finances. Using the animated “story” format popularized by social media, Money Story reveals spending habits to consumers in an engaging and familiar way.
‘We’re Realists’: BNPL Platform Zip Inches Toward Sustainability After Winding Down International Operations
Modern Retail
For one buy now, pay later platform, sizing down its operations may unlock the path to profitability amid changes in consumer spending and a tightening of the BNPL market. Australia-based BNPL platform Zip Co. shut down its operations in the United Kingdom and Singapore late last year. In turn, it decreased its cash burn and ended the year with $78.5 million in cash and liquidity, according to its second-quarter earnings report released Tuesday.
Project Icebreaker Uses Retail CBDC for Instant P2P Cross Border Payments
Ledger Insights
There’s been considerable work on the concept of using wholesale (interbank) central bank digital currencies (CBDC) to address the frictions of cross border payments. So far, only one project has taken the alternative route of interlinking multiple retail domestic CBDCs to enable consumers or businesses to make direct person-to-person international payments. To do just that, the Bank of Israel is working with the central banks of Norway and Sweden and the Nordic BIS Innovation Hub on Project Icebreaker, as announced in September last year.
On the wires
Universal Digital Payments Network (UDPN) is Launched to Support Seamless Digital Payments Across Multiple Central Bank Digital Currencies and Regulated Stablecoins
PR Newswire
Launched at Davos during the World Economic Forum week, the Universal Digital Payments Network (UDPN) is a DLT-underpinned messaging backbone focused on providing interoperability between the fast-growing number of different regulated stablecoins and CBDCs, and seamless connectivity between any business IT system and regulated digital currencies. At the Davos launch event, representatives from leading global financial institutions Deutsche Bank, HSBC, Standard Chartered, The Bank of East Asia, and Akbank discussed the rapidly evolving world of digital currency, the importance of interoperability, and the need for an infrastructure to support these developments.
January 24, 2023
On the web
OnlineCheckWriter.com Announces FreshBooks Integration
EIN News
OnlineCheckWriter.com, a leading b2b payments platform, announced that its customers can now easily integrate their FreshBooks accounts with its platform to handle payments and accounting tasks. The integration allows FreshBooks users to streamline their payment process, from invoicing to issuing payments, all in one place.
As Mobile Wallets Gain in Popularity, Growing Number of Americans Still Prefer Convenience of Plastic
J.D. Power
Ever find yourself away from home without your smartphone? It feels like you accidentally left an appendage behind. Modern life virtually requires that each of us has our devices accessible at any time. So how is it that most Americans still find that using a credit card is more convenient than a mobile wallet? According to J.D. Power data, mobile wallet usage among Americans continues to grow in stores, but the percentage of customers that still say it is easier to use a physical credit/debit card than a mobile wallet is on the rise.
Visa to Power Digital Tipping with eTip Partnership
Business Travel News
Digital tipping platform eTip is partnering with Visa to speed up the process and adoption of its tool, the company announced. The platform enables guests at hotels and other service industry customers to tip housekeepers, bellhops, valet attendants and other staff with their digital wallet or credit card, including corporate cards. Guests can scan a QR code or NFC tag—or some hotels opt to send the tipping information via text—and can provide their payment information, eTip CEO Nicolas Cassis said. With the new Visa collaboration, eTip can use the Visa rails so that the tip payments can go immediately into the employees' digital wallets, he said.
Haptic Authentication for Blind, Low-Vision Users Tested by US, Canadian Academics
Biometric Update
A new method for authenticating blind and low-vision (BLV) users via haptic vibrations has been tested by researchers at the University of Waterloo and the Rochester Institute of Technology. Called OneButtonPIN, the new method is described in a study published in the Proceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction journal and aims to make authentication more user-friendly and secure for BLV individuals.
On the wires
Digital Euro Will be Free But Limited in Scope, ECB says
Reuters
The digital version of the euro currency will be free to use and available to all but the European Central Bank does not want to keep any personal data on its users, ECB board member Fabio Panetta said on Monday. The ECB is working on a digital version of its currency and is in the process of outlining the broader design, also hoping to alleviate concerns that the digital currency could disrupt the financial system and give the central bank too much data on citizens.
German Cartel Office Initiates Proceedings against PayPal
Reuters
Germany's cartel office regulator said on Monday it had initiated proceedings against payment company PayPal Europe over the possibility that it hindered competition. The subject of the proceedings was PayPal's rules for extra charges and the presentation of PayPal in the terms of use for Germany, the watchdog said. PayPal did not immediately reply to a request for comment. The regulator is investigating in particular rules that say merchants may not offer their goods and services at a lower price to customers who choose a cheaper payment method than PayPal.
January 23, 2023
On the web
Introductory Statement by Fabio Panetta, Member of the Executive Board of the ECB, at the Committee on Economic and Monetary Affairs of the European Parliament
European Central Bank
Our investigation into a digital euro started more than a year ago. Closely involving the European Parliament in the investigation phase has been a priority for the ECB from day one. Over the course of 2022, we regularly discussed key design options in this Committee...People’s payment behaviour is changing at an unprecedented speed: over the past three years, cash payments in the euro area have dropped from 72% to 59%, with digital payments becoming increasingly popular (Chart 1).
Ransomware Victims are Refusing to Pay, Tanking Attackers’ Profits
Ars Technica
Two new studies suggest that ransomware isn't the lucrative, enterprise-scale gotcha it used to be. Profits to attackers' wallets, and the percentage of victims paying, fell dramatically in 2022, according to two separate reports. Chainalysis, a blockchain analysis firm that has worked with a number of law enforcement and government agencies, suggests in a blog post that based on payments to cryptocurrency addresses it has identified as connected to ransomware attacks, payments to attackers fell from $766 million in 2021 to $457 million last year.
Stripe Signs Deal to Process More of Amazon’s Payments
The Irish Times
Irish-founded payments technology company Stripe has signed an expanded deal with Amazon that will see the fintech process more of the online retailer’s payments. The new agreement will see Stripe become a strategic payments partner for Amazon in the US, Europe and Canada, processing payments for Prime, Audible, Kindle, Amazon Pay, Buy With Prime and other Amazon services. That accounts for a significant part of Amazon’s total payments volume.
Bank of America, JPMorgan and Other Banks Reportedly Team Up on Digital Wallet to Rival Apple Pay
CNBC
Several banks are reportedly working on a digital wallet that links with debit and credit cards to compete with Apple Pay and PayPal. According to the Wall Street Journal, the digital wallet would be operated by Early Warning Services, a joint venture from several banks that also runs Zelle. The major banks involved include Wells Fargo, JPMorgan Chase and Bank of America, according to the report.
Can a Save-to-Pay-Later Model Forestall the Pitfalls of Buy Now, Pay Later in Nigeria?
Techpoint Africa
Once in a while, a new technology comes along that completely upends an entire industry. Other times, old industries are reimagined using technology. Buy now, pay later’s recent rise certainly belongs to the latter. For many Nigerians growing up in low or middle-income households, buying a product from merchants with a promise to pay later, usually at the end of the month when salaries are paid, is not entirely a foreign concept.
On the wires
BNY Mellon and Fiserv Expand Real-Time FX Rate Quotes Capabilities for Payments from U.S. Financial Institutions
PR Newswire
BNY Mellon and Fiserv, a leading global provider of payments and financial services technology, have joined forces to deliver additional capabilities for real-time foreign exchange (FX) rate quotes for payments from U.S. financial institutions. Using innovative application programming interface (API) connectivity, financial institutions leveraging Payments Exchange: Foreign Exchange Services from Fiserv can now seamlessly access BNY Mellon's real-time FX rate quotes in over 120 currencies without the need for additional integration.
January 20, 2023
On the web
Who Pays For Your Rewards? Redistribution in the Credit Card Market
Federal Reserve
We study credit card rewards as an ideal laboratory to quantify redistribution between consumers in retail financial markets. Comparing cards with and without rewards, we find that, regardless of income, sophisticated individuals profit from reward credit cards at the expense of naive consumers. To probe the underlying mechanisms, we exploit bank-initiated account limit increases at the card level and show that reward cards induce more spending, leaving naive consumers with higher unpaid balances. Naive consumers also follow a sub-optimal balance-matching heuristic when repaying their credit cards, incurring higher costs....
Six Ways to Increase Transaction Approvals (and Revenue)
DevPro Journal
The current economy has significantly altered consumer buying behaviors and business operations...Let’s explore ways that you can help merchants mitigate the ongoing pain points by offering solutions that help them increase authorization rates, which results in more sales and revenue.
Universal Digital Payments Network for Stablecoins, CBDCs Launches at Davos
Forkast
The Universal Digital Payments Network (UDPN) was launched today at the World Economic Forum to provide interoperability between regulated stablecoins and central bank digital currencies (CBDCs). UDPN is an “advanced digital currency payments project” that “has the potential to drive down the cost of digital payments and accelerate adoption by banks and businesses of all sizes.”
On the wires
Bluefin Adds Network Tokenization Through Visa Technology
Businesswire
Bluefin, a leader in integrated payments and data and payment security, today announced it has teamed up with Visa for network tokenization. Through this collaboration, Bluefin will integrate directly with Visa to provide network tokens across card brands.
Paymentus Adds Retail Access Points with Green Dot to Growing Suite of Cash Bill Pay Solutions To Serve Cash-Preferred, Underbanked and Unbanked Consumers
Businesswire
Paymentus Holdings Inc., a leading electronic bill presentment and payment provider, today unveiled expanded Cash Bill Pay capabilities on its Instant Payment Network®. Powered by Green Dot Corporation’s expansive Green Dot Network, billers connected to the Instant Payment Network will be able to accept cash payments from customers made at more than 90,000 retail locations.
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