Merchant acceptance, payments, and network and financial technology were the key pillars propelling Fiserv Inc.âs better -than-expected organic growth during the fourth quarter and for fiscal year 2022. Organic revenue growthâgrowth apart from recent acquisitionsâfor the three core segments of Fiservâs business increased 17%, 9%, and 5%, respectively, compared to a year earlier. Overall, Fiserv posted a 12% increase in organic revenue for the quarter and an 11% jump year-over-year for the year.
A Crypto.com commercial during last year's Super Bowl featured LeBron James and a 2003 version of himself sitting down for a heart-to-heart, with the younger James asking the elder: Is the hype too much? Am I ready? To which the elder replies: I can't tell you everything, but if you want to make history, you've got to call your own shots. The commercial, along with those from FTX (Larry David as a costumed pitch man), Coinbase (floating QR code) and eToro, marked notable investments by cryptocurrency companies seeking to go mainstream and join the big, traditional Super Bowl ad categories, leading some industry watchers to refer to last year's game as the "Crypto Bowl."
On the retail side of things, LVI was the metaverse Super Bowl: The NFL partnered with gaming world Roblox to sell virtual jerseys, and Miller Lite built a virtual bar in Decentraland for fans to watch the game. âMetaverseâ became one of the most viral words of the year, with luxury brands, big box retailers, and everyone in between making moves in virtual worlds. This year, as the retail world grapples with changing consumer behavior, spending, and perceptions, retail metaverse activations are taking a backseat at the Super Bowl.
PayPal said on Thursday that CEO Dan Schulman will retire and leave the online payments company at the end of 2023. Schulman, who became PayPal CEO after the split from eBay in 2015, notified the company of his decision to retire at the end of December. He will remain a member of PayPalâs board of directors, which is hiring a search firm to find a successor. âIâm proud of what we have accomplished at PayPal and of the incredibly talented and committed people I work with every day,â Schulman said in a statement.
Citing economic turbulence, buy now, pay later giant Affirm announced today that it is reducing its staff by 19%, or about 500 employees, and shutting down its crypto unit.
That leaves the company with about 2,000 employees. In a written statement, Founder and CEO Max Levchin said that he takes âfull responsibility for this decision and for those leading up to it.â The company did not specify which departments would be affected by the move.
The Electronic Transactions Association (ETA) and DiscoverÂŽ Global Network are proud to recognize the 2023 Forty Under 40 honorees, a distinguished group of trailblazers and innovators who are transforming the payments technology industry. "The Forty Under 40 honorees of 2023 are proof of the immense potential for payments technology to create a brighter future for everyone," said Jodie Kelley, CEO of ETA. "Their innovative spirit and dedication will help propel the industry forward, leading to greater accessibility, security, and efficiency in payments solutions."
As inflation and macroeconomic concerns weigh on consumer demand, Lightspeed Commerce says it will focus on acquiring larger merchants in its pursuit of profitability. Jean Paul Chauvet, chief executive of the Montreal-based payment software company, says economic uncertainty and shifting investor sentiment around the technology industry have pushed the company to focus on acquiring larger clients to its customer base.
Visa, the biggest card network company in the U.S., said last year that McInerney would succeed Al Kelly, who became the companyâs executive chairman on Feb. 1. McInerneyâs overall compensation package last year was $17.1 million, according to the December proxy filing. In his new post, McInerney has already begun rearranging leaders at the company, promoting a handful of executives to new posts recently. Also, Visa announced in a blog post that it has fulfilled a 2021 plan to open a new office in Atlanta, which is expected to expand from about 350 employees today to 1,000 in the next several years.
Apple has expanded the internal testing for its Pay service's buy now, pay later feature to include its retail employees, according to Bloomberg. When the tech giant's experimental features make their way to its retail staff, that's typically a sign that it's going to be released in the near future. Apple Store workers started testing the company's credit card in 2019 a month before it became available, and staff at its HQ visitor center tested Tap to Pay shortly before the first partner companies like Square and PayPal launched support for the payment solution.
Adobe Analyticsâ findings reveal that BNPL comprised of 12% of online purchases in January this year, indicating that shoppers are becoming more price-conscious in the wake of the cost of living crisis. The average order value of BNPL purchases has also increased as shoppers are opting to pay for higher value products over a longer period.
Starting now, eligible American Express cardholders can use a virtual card number in place of their actual credit card information when shopping with Google Pay and Chrome. Virtual card numbers, including a CVV security code, are generated by machine learning algorithms at the time of sale, and thanks to Googleâs partnerships with banks like Amex, this still bills you and earns rewards as if you entered your regular credit card number.
Remember the metaverse? For those whose memories are short, the metaverse is the virtual or alternative world in which we are supposed to interact, wearing expensive virtual-reality headsets and representing ourselves via avatars, our virtual doubles. It was the new big thing, swore Mark Zuckerberg, the king of social networks, who went so far as to rename his empire after the concept, calling it Meta Platforms.
Bed Bath & Beyond, Americaâs quintessential home furnishingsâ chain, is fighting to stay in business. The company has avoided a bankruptcy filing for now by completing a complex stock offering that will give it an immediate injection of $225 million in funds and a pledge for $800 million in the future to pay down its current debt load. Bed Bath & Beyond is also shrinking to save money. The company said it plans to close around 400 of its roughly 760 Bed Bath & Beyond stores. It will keep open its most profitable stores in key markets.
Amazon is rethinking its grocery strategy and will slow the expansion of its brick-and-mortar grocery stores, company executives said during a call with investors. Brian Olsavsky, the e-commerce giantâs chief financial officer, during Amazonâs Feb. 2 fourth-quarter earnings call said the retailer would close stores in certain markets. âWe're continuously refining our store formats to find the ones that will resonate with customers, will build our grocery brand and will allow us to scale meaningfully over time,â Olsavsky told investors.
Instacart has become a major part of how many Americans shop for groceries online. Now it is moving ahead with plans to become a fixture of how they shop in stores, as well.
The company recently announced the first full implementation of its Scan & Pay solution. A few weeks ago, Long Island City grocery store Foodcellar Market deployed the solution, which allows customers to scan both center-store products and produce with their own smartphones and check out from anywhere in the store.
The Merchants Payments Coalition told a House committee holding a hearing on economic threats from China today that passage of the Credit Card Competition Act is needed to keep China from âinfiltratingâ the U.S. payments processing market. âMPC has grave concerns over the level of involvement that China has in our nationâs payment system,â MPC said in a letter to the House Financial Services Committee. âPreventing China from infiltrating the U.S. payments system is one of our top priorities.â
The SEC is investigating San Francisco-based cryptocurrency exchange Kraken for violating securities laws, according to reports. Bloomberg reported Wednesday that the investigation was at an "advanced stage" and "could lead to a settlement in coming days," citing an unnamed person familiar with the matter.
Attention online shoppers: Your favorite digital boutique may be exposing customer data through badly configured backups. A study of 2,037 e-commerce shops found that 250 of them had backups that contained private information and that were stored in publicly accessible folders with no access restrictions. The report from Sansec, an Amsterdam firm that helps merchants secure their online stores, says such backups can be easy to find.
The chief executive of JPMorgan Chase & Co., the biggest U.S. bank, cautioned against declaring victory against inflation too early, warning the Federal Reserve could raise interest rates above the 5% mark if higher prices ended up "sticky." Dimon's warning came after Federal Reserve officials said more rate rises are on the cards, although none were ready to suggest that January's hot jobs report could push them back to a more aggressive monetary policy stance.
The US labor market remains âextraordinarily strongâ and Fridayâs monster jobs report underscored that the central bank has more work to do to bring down inflation, Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell said Tuesday. âWe didnât expect it to be this strong,â Powell said of the January jobs report, which showed the US economy added 517,000 jobs. âIt kind of shows you why we think that this will be a process that takes a significant period of time.â
Worker filings for unemployment benefits rose last week but remained historically low, reflecting a tight labor market despite company layoff announcements. Initial jobless claims, a proxy for layoffs, increased by 13,000 to a seasonally adjusted 196,000 last week, the Labor Department said Thursday. In 2019, when the labor market was also tight, claims averaged about 220,000 a week.
Dutch payments processor Adyen NV on Wednesday reported a 4.1% rise in its second-half core earnings, missing analysts' expectations and knocking its shares as its margins were hit by higher staffing and investment costs. Adyen shares were down 15% to 1,299 euros at 0813 GMT, erasing most of their strong January rally. "The world economy was volatile in H2 2022, with high inflation and geopolitical instability creating a challenging period for global commerce," the company that helps processes payments for Facebook, Uber and Netflix said in a statement.
âNot even a year ago we launched our first Edition, and now our Winter â23 Edition showcases over a hundred more products and features weâve built in the last six months alone,â said Harley Finkelstein, President, Shopify. âWe need to be the fastest moving commerce company in the world because our merchants depend on Shopifyâs innovation for their own longevity."
American ExpressÂŽ is expanding its decades-long relationship with Microsoft to develop a suite of solutions built on Microsoft Cloud and AI technologies focused on reducing business travel friction for employees and businesses. The first solution developed through this collaboration will enhance the expense management process by addressing some of the pain points business travelers and expense processors face.
âOur fourth quarter results represented a good finish to a year where we executed extremely well even with the challenging macroeconomic environment throughout 2022,â said Michael Hayford, Chief Executive Officer. âWe delivered solid financial performance, made progress on our strategy to NCR becoming a software-led as-a-service company with higher recurring revenue streams, and demonstrated our unwavering commitment to our customers with further increases in our customer satisfaction metrics."
Bank of America announced a record-breaking year for patents received in 2022 with 608 patents granted, a 19% increase year over year. The patents represent innovation across many areas including artificial intelligence, machine learning, information security, data analytics, mobile banking, and payments. This record was achieved as the United States Patent and Trademark Office issued about 1% fewer patents overall in 2022.
As consumers continue to seek day-to-day convenience, the number of digital banking users continues to grow, delivering significant benefits to financial institutions that offer these services. In 2022, the approximately 2,500 banks and credit unions that leverage online and mobile banking solutions from Fiserv, Inc., a leading global provider of payments and financial services technology solutions, saw average year-over-year organic user growth of 9%, demonstrating the strong ongoing demand for these services.
Mastercard and global video game commerce company Xsolla announced plans to collaborate on frictionless, secure, and rewarding payments for gamers â from enhanced checkout experiences using credit card loyalty points[1] to simple in-game currency gifting to improved creator payout processes and more. The partnership will combine Mastercard's technology, network-level expertise, global scale, and trusted connections with Xsolla's platform to create customizable and more accessible payment experiences for players, developers, and creators.
Visa Inc. announced new offers aimed to help small and micro businesses (SMBs) accept digital payments, fine-tune their essential systems and save on the technology needed to grow and build business resilience. âDespite over 80% of small businesses using a credit card for their business spend, we see that almost one-third still use their personal card,â said Veronica Fernandez, SVP and North America Head of Business Solutions at Visa.
Amaryllis, a global leader in cloud-based technology platforms, announced that Menda Sims has been named as President, effective February 1, 2023. âAfter a thorough and deliberate selection process, the Board is delighted that Menda will lead Amaryllis as we navigate through the evolving and expanding landscape of financial technology,â said Ori Hay, CEO and Chairman of the Board. âMenda is recognized as a forward thinker, skilled at aligning innovative talent approaches with accelerating business goals.
Repay Holdings Corporation, a leading provider of vertically-integrated payment solutions, announced a new integration with HelloGM, an analytics and automation platform that centralizes hospitality performance data and operations from property management, accounting, and labor services as well as guest review sites. The integration will enable hospitality operators, owners and executives that use HelloGM to streamline accounts payable processes and securely pay vendors and suppliers for multiple properties.
Greg Daily, Chairman and CEO of i3 Verticals, commented, âThe first quarter of our fiscal year 2023 produced fantastic results and we are proud to share them with the market. Revenue and adjusted EBITDA continued to set records and annualized recurring revenue continued to outpace other revenue streams.
In cooperation with its partner AVEM, Worldline, a global leader in payments services, successfully implemented an updated ATM fleet roll-out for Groupe Les Mousquetaires (GLM), a key European player in the mass distribution market. GLM now benefits from bolstered operational flexibility, with Worldlineâs modular ATM management solutions designed to reduce risks and improve profitability. This milestone reinforces Worldlineâs key position within the French ATM market.
Bluefin, the recognized integrated payments leader in PCI-validated encryption and tokenization technologies that protect payments and sensitive data, announced that Everi Payments Inc., the wholly owned subsidiary and FinTech business of Everi Holdings Inc., entered into an agreement with Bluefin to bring a new level of payment security to their casino gaming customer base.
"We saw strong financial results in Q2, with all-time high record revenue in transaction fees, subscription fees and total revenue, which demonstrates we are making progress on our strategic initiatives and working towards our vision to become the global market leader in providing technology that powers self-service commerce,â said Ravi Venkatesan, chief executive officer, Cantaloupe. âThe acquisition of Three Square Market (â32Mâ) was also completed in the quarter."
BankiFi, a leading provider of embedded banking solutions, has selected Steve Ellis as the boardâs newest member. Ellisâ addition to the team is just the latest in BankiFiâs recent dedication to the North American market. Ellis has over 35 years of experience in banking, leadership and financial services. Ellis was formerly the executive vice president and head of the innovation group at Wells Fargo, having previously spearheaded their wholesale services group.
Global fraud prevention company SEON has acquired compliance and anti-money laundering (AML) firm Complytron, adding AML capabilities to its fraud-fighting toolkit to launch a unified fraud, AML and fincrime platform. The deal, which officially completed in January 2023, follows SEONâs $94 million Series B investment in early 2022.
GoCardless, a global leader in direct bank payments, has launched GoCardless Embed, a new integration for third party payment providers to access its global bank payment network and reap the benefits of bank-to-bank payments. GoCardless Embed, which comes white labelled as standard, allows payment providers to integrate GoCardless' global bank payment network straight into their platform through a single, simple API.
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