Fast Payments

Payments Post #3: Glenbrook's April Roundup

Welcome back to Payments Post. Last month’s edition was all about banks; this month’s is about “paying by bank”. Or to be a bit more semantically precise, account-to-account (A2A) payments. We were particularly interested in Visa’s Visa+ initiative, iDEAL’s apparent pan-European future, and Plaid’s upcoming payouts product. Regular contributor Justin Pituch digs in this week […]

Banking

Payments Post #2: Glenbrook's March Roundup

Surprise! We spent a lot of the past month thinking about banks. March confronted us with stumbling blocks for fintechs and their sponsor banks, a bank-led battle for the checkout page, and a clearer view of the path forward for U.S. fast payments. Let’s dive into it in this second edition of Payments Post, our […]

Banking Merchant Acquirers Risk & Fraud

Examining Risk and Resiliency in Banking Relationships (..and no, we’re not just talking about bank failures)

On Monday a few weeks back, a member of a client’s executive team gave me a call: “We really need to speed up the project to find another bank sponsor.” That was followed by a call from another client later that day: “We’ve been thinking about what it would take to form a relationship with […]

Tags: Chris Uriarte Fintech Risk Management

BNPL Open Banking Security

2023: A Big Year for Regulation in the US?

As we dive into the new year, we at Glenbrook reflect on the key themes and learnings within payments from 2022 and assess what we believe will emerge as key trends in 2023. My colleague Chris Uriarte recently shared his 8 Payments and Fintech trends for 2023 on LinkedIn, where he discussed fraud and embedded […]

Payments Views

Decoupled Debit: How Fintechs Profited from Durbin

This Payments Views post was jointly authored by Neel Saunshi and Andrew Liang If you have followed the Durbin Amendment since its 2011 implementation, you have seen stakeholders adapt in different ways. Consumers saw their debit rewards programs disappear. Large financial institutions (banks and credit unions) added fees and shifted marketing to their credit card […]

Open Banking

The Open Banking Phenomenon, Explained

Time to Read: 9 minutes Highlights: An introduction to open banking, its key concepts, and implications for payments industry participants  A framework for understanding open banking principles Adoption and usage statistics   What is Open Banking and Why Does it Matter? Over the last few years, the concept of open banking has gained popularity with […]

ACH

ACH is Hot

Time to Read: 8 minutes Highlights: ACH, though a 50-year old payment system in the U.S., continues to grow The ACH ecosystem is evolving to meet modern-day needs: Nacha, the rule-making body, plans to implement a series of enhancements that address shortcomings in ACH usability Dynamic payment service providers (PSPs) and fintech infrastructure players are […]

Financial Inclusion

The True Cost of Being Underbanked

Highlights It’s expensive to be a low income American, driven in part by the high cost of financial services available to such consumers. In this post, we break down where cost comes from, and how fintechs are changing the way working class Americans are able to access affordable financial products. Fintechs have an opportunity to […]

Financial Inclusion

Where is Financial Inclusion in the U.S. Today?

At Glenbrook, international financial inclusion work has long been a major focus area. Given the challenges racial equity concerns raises for the U.S., Glenbrook as a firm has returned our focus to financial inclusion here at home. To begin that examination, we look at the state of financial inclusion in the US and what are […]

Cannabis Payments Views

The Latest on Cannabis and CBD Payments

Hosted as part of the Mobile Payment Conference (August 24-26) this inaugural conference brought together fintech influencers, payments experts, and providers to address issues facing financial services companies serving the Cannabis and CBD industry. Setting the Stage I was honored to kick off the workshop with an overview of the cannabis payments market. I stressed […]

Glenbrook Nicole Pinto Payments Views

COVID-19 and the Income Domain

The Income Domain consists of payments to individuals for salary, benefits, rebates, and expense reimbursements. In the U.S., these payments are made primarily via direct deposit through NACHA’s ACH system, and to a lesser extent, paper checks and payroll cards. The COVID-19 pandemic has led to widespread business shutdown, and as a result, caused mass […]

Glenbrook

Remote Commerce Domain Takes Center Stage

Expansion Under COVID-19 The Remote Commerce domain is home to e-commerce, many mobile payments, and the venerable mail-order, telephone-order method (MOTO). The growth in transaction volume in this domain has been nothing short of phenomenal accounting for a: 56 percent of overall U.S. retail sales growth in 2019 47 percent increase in U.S. sales forecasted […]

Glenbrook Payments Views

Point of Sale Domain - The Pain at the POS

The POS Domain is Synonymous with the Retail Industry The POS Commerce domain is the land of brick and mortar retail, representing the majority of retail activity. Despite the steady double digit annual growth of the Remote Commerce domain, the POS Commerce domain was responsible for  some 84% of retail sales in 2019. That said, […]

Elizabeth McQuerry Glenbrook Government Payments Payments Views

Where Necessity Meets Innovation - Government Disbursement in the Time of COVID-19

Given the coronavirus pandemic and its pressure on governments and individuals alike, Glenbrook’s Global Practice has been looking into how emergency social disbursements can be made quickly to the most vulnerable populations. This is not an easy task for a number of reasons: Governments want to be certain that the intended person is indeed the […]

Erin McCune Glenbrook Payments Views Women Professionals

Dispatch from the 2020 U.S. Women in Payments Symposium, February 10-11, 2020

This Women in Payments event has been going on for at least 5 years and this was the first time I attended — I regret that it took so long! Hats off to Kristy Duncan and her team for putting together a substantive event with a refreshing mix of industry insight and professional development and […]