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January 12, 2026
Top Post
Google Announces a New Protocol to Facilitate Commerce Using AI Agents
TechCrunch
"Google announced a new open standard, called the Universal Commerce Protocol (UCP) for AI agent-based shopping, at the National Retail Federation (NRF) conference. The standard, developed with companies like Shopify, Etsy, Wayfair, Target, and Walmart, lets agents work across different parts of customer buying processes, including discovery and post-purchase support. The core idea is that the standard could facilitate these various parts of the process instead of requiring connections with different agents."
On the web
Global Payments Completes Acquisition of Worldpay and Divestiture of Issuer Solutions Business
Global Payments Inc.
"Global Payments Inc. announced the successful completion of its acquisition of Worldpay from FIS and GTCR, and the divestiture of its Issuer Solutions business to FIS. The transactions transform Global Payments into a pure-play, commerce solutions provider, serving the full spectrum of clients, from small businesses to global enterprises worldwide."
Federal Reserve Financial Services to Take New Actions to Support Penny Circulation
FRB Services
"Federal Reserve Financial Services (FRFS) today announced new actions to better support the circulation of pennies for commercial activity. Beginning on Jan. 14, the Federal Reserve will resume accepting pennies from banks and credit unions at commercial coin distribution locations providing services under arrangements with the Federal Reserve that were previously suspended."
Etsy Enables Direct Purchase in Microsoft Copilot AI Assistant
Chain Store Age
"Etsy is expanding its capability to let customers shop and make purchases within AI agents. The e-commerce retailer is partnering with Microsoft and payment processing provider Stripe to make eligible items available for purchase directly in Copilot Checkout on web browser for signed-in Microsoft users in the U.S. With this offering, Etsy is building on a partnership it launched with ChatGPT, the generative AI model from research and deployment company Open AI, in fall 2025."
Over Half of US Shoppers Would Trust AI To Shop on Their Behalf, Shows Adyen Research
Adyen
"Adyen’s Retail Report reveals the use of AI assistants by US shoppers has more than doubled year-over-year, soaring from 12% to 35%. 51% of shoppers would be open to AI handling the entire shopping process, including making the final purchase. The vast majority of retailers (88%) are open to enabling AI to complete purchases on the shopper’s behalf, with 56% prioritizing this technology for the year ahead."
January 9, 2026
Top Post
Inside Agentic Commerce: A New Way to Transact Raises New Questions
Mastercard
"As AI agents shop and pay on behalf of consumers, the payments ecosystem is tackling challenges around intent, fraud prevention and accountability."
On the web
Fiserv Launches Unknown Shopper at NRF, Helping Merchants Better Understand In-Store Customers
Fiserv, Inc.
"Fiserv, Inc. announced the launch of Unknown Shopper from Fiserv, a new analytics capability designed to help merchants and their marketing partners better understand in-store customer behavior and build actionable customer segments from card-present transactions."
Building a Smoother Path to Instant Payments in Ethiopia
AfricaNenda
"Ethiopia has been steadily advancing its digital payments landscape. Banks, microfinance institutions, and new market players are working hard to offer customers faster and more reliable ways to move money. But as the sector grows, many institutions face the same challenge: connecting their systems to the national Instant Payment System (IPS) in a way that doesn’t require major internal restructuring. EthSwitch’s new middleware initiative was created to address exactly this challenge."
Fireblocks Acquires TRES: Delivering the First Complete Operating System for Digital Assets
Fireblocks
"Fireblocks announced the acquisition of TRES Finance, a leader in crypto accounting, reconciliation, and financial controls for digital assets. Together, they are forming the foundational infrastructure for an onchain financial world, integrating financial controls into critical business operations."
Toast Delivers Precision Insights, Action, and Efficiency for Retailers
Toast
"Toast announced its latest platform updates for retailers, including retail-specific capabilities to its Toast IQ AI assistant and a host of core platform updates designed to help retailers operate faster and more efficiently, driving their businesses forward. The Toast IQ AI assistant enables retailers to move at the speed of conversation by instantly showing users what’s selling, what’s running low, and where margin opportunities lie in their business."
Visa and JPMorgan Use Solana Rails But One Risk Still Worries Banks
Yahoo Finance
"Major financial institutions, including JPMorgan and Visa, are increasingly turning to for real-world money settlements. One metric continues to raise questions among institutions: the degree of control over the network. Solana has hundreds of validators, but stake distribution matters more. The Nakamoto Coefficient, a measure of how many entities could theoretically disrupt the network, stands around 20-30 based on recent data. This indicates that a limited number of validators control a significant portion of staked SOL."
Penny Shortage Pushes Fed to Restart Coin Deposits
Axios
"The worsening U.S. penny shortage has prompted the Federal Reserve to resume accepting penny deposits on Jan. 14 at more coin distribution locations. The move could ease checkout friction for cash-paying shoppers, where a lack of coins has led to rounding, confusion and longer lines. The move is limited and does not restart penny production. It falls short of a fix, retailers say."
Visa’s New Stablecoin Payout Pilot
The European Business Review
"Visa’s recent announcement of a new pilot program marks a significant step in the crypto world, where businesses will be able to make USD-backed stablecoin payouts directly to vendors’ wallets. This pilot, in simple terms, enables companies to make payments in traditional fiat currencies, while recipients can choose to receive their payments in a US dollar-pegged stablecoin, such as USDC."
Deluxe to Implement Visa Direct to Enable Fast, Seamless Payments with dlxFastFunds
Deluxe Corporation
"Deluxe announced its collaboration with Visa to implement Visa Direct. This collaboration introduces dlxFastFundsSM, a funding solution that leverages Visa’s trusted payment network to help businesses take control of their cash flow by skipping the typical one- to two-day settlement delay. This integrated solution is designed to reinforce operations with quicker access to capital, ideal for covering inventory, payroll, or reinvestment opportunities."
Education: Beyond Bitcoin: The Blockchain Story
Barclays
"Blockchain is a digital ledger that securely records and verifies transactions in a distributed network. The system’s decentralised structure ensures transparency, security and trust without the need for intermediaries. Given blockchain’s close association with cryptocurrencies, blockchain companies offer indirect exposure to crypto markets. However, as the technology expanded into new sectors such as healthcare, manufacturing and artificial intelligence (AI), blockchain companies now deliver more than just crypto exposure.
January 8, 2026
Top Post
Survey: Gen Z, Millennials Are Ditching the Credit Card for Other Payment Methods
US News
"A U.S. News survey shows that younger consumers are less inclined to use credit cards than baby boomers are. A significant percentage of respondents either missed a credit card payment or overdrew their checking account in the past year. Almost half of respondents mistakenly believe that debit cards help build credit."
JPMorgan to Replace Goldman as Apple Card Issuer
Yahoo Finance
"JPMorgan Chase and Apple on Wednesday announced a deal under which the bank will become the new issuer of the Apple Card, replacing Goldman Sachs, further expanding the biggest U.S. bank's credit card franchise. The move is estimated to bring over $20 billion in card balances to Chase's platform once completed, the companies said. JPMorgan expects to record a $2.2 billion provision for credit losses in the fourth quarter of 2025 tied to the forward purchase commitment of the portfolio."
On the web
Stripe Helps Power a New Shopping Experience in Microsoft Copilot
Stripe
"Stripe announced that it is helping power a new experience called Copilot Checkout. Copilot users in the US will be able to buy products from Etsy businesses and retailers like Urban Outfitters and Anthropologie, all without leaving the chat. When a Copilot conversation naturally leads to a shopping experience, a Stripe-powered checkout may appear natively within the chat. To populate the checkout, Microsoft communicates with Stripe through an integration. Stripe then connects with the seller via the Agentic Commerce Protocol, an open standard for agentic commerce codeveloped by Stripe."
CFPB: The Consumer Credit Card Market
Consumer Financial Protection Bureau
"This report represents the CFPB’s seventh biennial review of the consumer credit card market as directed by the Credit Card Accountability Responsibility and Disclosure Act of 2009. In this report, we analyze data from several sources to examine many aspects of the consumer credit card market as of the end of 2024. We revisit topics covered in earlier reports, such as deferred interest and innovations in the marketplace, while introducing new areas of focus this year. We analyze how cardholders spend by merchant category, review promotional interest rates, and take a deeper look into card transaction disputes."
Volante Technologies Unveils Low-Code Studio: A Game-Changer for Payment Implementation and Compliance
Volante Technologies
"Volante Technologies announced the launch of Volante Low-code Studio, an automated, low-code/no-code environment that redefines how banks design, deploy, and maintain payment workflows. Fully integrated with Volante’s cloud-native Payments Platform, the breakthrough solution equips financial institutions with pre-built capabilities and extensible patterns to take full control of their modernization journey and achieve unprecedented innovation and cost efficiency gains."
PayPal Powers Microsoft’s Launch of Copilot Checkout
PayPal
"PayPal announced that they are teaming up with Microsoft to support the launch of Copilot Checkout in Copilot, enabling shoppers to discover, decide, and pay—without ever leaving the Copilot experience. PayPal will power surfacing merchant inventory, branded checkout, guest checkout and credit card payments, starting with Copilot.com. Merchants’ product catalogs will seamlessly become purchasable leveraging PayPal’s store sync, a capability of PayPal’s recently launched agentic commerce services, which are designed to allow merchants to attract customers and future-proof their business in the new era of AI-powered commerce.
Bottomline Strengthens Business Payments Fraud Defense with Integrated, Multi-Layered Protection
Bottomline
Bottomline announced Payments Fraud Defense, an advanced and scalable payment fraud solution designed to facilitate industry collaboration and leverage AI-driven capabilities. It brings together behavioral analytics, interdiction precision, analytics tuning, and session replay into a single, integrated Payments Fraud Defense platform designed to complement existing fraud systems and accelerate detection.
Visa Launches Card-Based Trade Payment Platform
VIR
"Visa announced a partnership with VPBank, Shinhan Bank Vietnam, and MB to launch the Global Trade Payment Platform (GTPP), described as the market’s first global card-based solution for trade payments, enabling Vietnamese importers to pay South Korean suppliers using Visa Commercial Cards."
Fiserv Collaborates with Microsoft to Accelerate AI-Driven Innovation
Fiserv, Inc.
"Fiserv, Inc. announced a strategic collaboration with Microsoft to accelerate innovation by further embedding AI into Fiserv development platforms and empowering its global workforce with AI. The collaboration will boost internal productivity at Fiserv and deliver AI-driven solutions that create greater value for Fiserv clients, including financial institutions, businesses, and consumers."
January 7, 2026
Top Post
Apple Card Will Move From Goldman Sachs to JPMorgan Chase
MacRumors
"JPMorgan Chase has reached a deal to take over operation of the Apple Card reports The Wall Street Journal. Barring any "last minute hiccups," the deal should be announced shortly after over a year of negotiations. Alongside its new Apple Card partnership, JPMorgan Chase will reportedly launch a new Apple savings account, but existing users with Apple savings accounts at Goldman Sachs will not be automatically transitioned and will need to decide whether they want to stay at Goldman Sachs or open new accounts with Chase."
On the web
Stripe Users Can Now Pay With Crypto Through New crypto.com Partnership
Yahoo
"Stripe, the software used by millions of businesses to process payments, has just announced a partnership with Crypto.com to facilitate the acceptance of cryptocurrency. The collaboration will also allow Stripe users to purchase crypto with credit or debit cards. The new agreement will allow Stripe merchant customers to check out and pay with their favorite crypto or stablecoin."
JPMorgan to Issue Its JPM Stablecoin Directly on Privacy-Focused Canton Network
CoinDesk
"J.P. Morgan's Kinexys and Digital Asset plan to bring JPM Coin to the Canton Network, enhancing real-time, interoperable digital money. The initiative aims to bridge traditional finance and digital ledger technology while maintaining privacy and compliance. The integration will occur in phases throughout 2026, focusing on JPM Coin issuance, transfer, and redemption on the Canton Network."
NTT DOCOMO GLOBAL and Accenture Launch Universal Wallet Infrastructure [Video]
Business Wire
"NTT DOCOMO GLOBAL and Accenture are teaming up to develop and scale the Universal Wallet Infrastructure (UWI), a groundbreaking platform designed to deliver enterprise-grade digital trust services. The jointly developed infrastructure empowers organizations to issue, verify, and manage credentials and tokens across digital identity, money, assets, and documents—ensuring seamless interoperability across enterprises, governments, industries, and geographies."
The $2 Trillion Question: How Stablecoins Could Reshape American Finance
Banking Exchange
"An analysis of the Treasury's latest assessment on digital money and what it means for banks, investors, and the dollar's global dominance The U.S. Treasury’s Borrowing Advisory Committee recently delivered a comprehensive analysis that should have every banker, investor, and policymaker paying attention. Hidden within the technical jargon of a routine TBAC presentation lies a roadmap for one of the most significant transformations in American finance since the creation of money market funds."
Ghost Tap Malware Fuels Surge in Remote NFC Payment Fraud
Infosecurity Magazine
"A new wave of Android malware has been enabling cybercriminals to carry out unauthorized tap-to-pay transactions without physical access to victims’ bank cards... Once installed, the malware allows attackers to relay near-field communication (NFC) data remotely, making fraudulent transactions appear as legitimate in-person payments. Victims are typically targeted through smishing and vishing campaigns."
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