“Nigeria’s central bank is planning to issue licenses to more payment providers, aiming to “improve the country’s financial-inclusion rate to 80% by the end of next year from about 60%,” Bloomberg reports . Central Bank of Nigeria Governor Godwin Emefiele spoke in Abuja last week, promising the new licenses “will help support innovation and competition as all parties work to increase their customer base.” “Nigerians in underserved locations will have access to cost effective payment services, cash-in and cash-out facilities, and savings products,” he said.”

“2020 once seemed futuristic enough to envision transformation at scale, yet close enough to set as a target and hit goals. As 2019 draws to a close, Mint invites corporate leaders to share their vision for the next decade. Sachin Bansal, co-founder and CEO, Navi Technologies, co-founder of Flipkart and technology entrepreneur, shares five ideas with Madhurima Nandy on the importance of financial inclusion.”

“If the banks had been willing to offer an API, Mint’s job would have been simpler. But despite a standard format for financial data interchange called OFX (Open Financial Exchange), few financial institutions were offering any way for their customers to extract their own financial data. The banks believed that locking in their users’ data could work to their benefit, as the value of having all your financial info in one place meant that once a bank locked in a customer for savings and checking, it could sell them credit cards and brokerage services.”

“Tink, a Stockholm-based open banking platform, said it has expanded its European presence with entries into Portugal and Italy as well as opening a new office in Madrid, Spain. Tink officials said the Portugal launch follows a September agreement with Caixa Geral de Depositos, which launched a consumer banking app called Dabox, which includes aggregation, payment initiation, data enrichment and personal financial management technology from the Tink platform”

“New technology and payments innovation are transforming the way Canadian consumers and businesses make payments, according to data from Payments Canada’s annual Canadian Payments Methods and Trends report.  In pursuit of more convenient, faster and secure payment experiences, Canadians are rapidly adopting newer digital channels, such as contactless (tapping card or mobile), e-commerce, mobile and online transfers, in favour of more traditional ‘paper and coin’ payments. The newly released 2019 report analysed the 21.1 billion payment transactions made in 2018, totalling more than CA$9.9 trillion in value. The study points to insights and trends that continue to transform the payments landscape.”

“But the e-commerce shopping binge also attracted plenty of active fraudsters. While the final number of actual fraudulent transactions isn’t available yet, the volume of online transactions that took place from Black Friday through Cyber Monday and were suspected of fraud rose fully 60% compared to the same number in 2017, according to iovation Inc. , a Portland, Ore.-based company that specializes in device authentication. The increase in suspected fraud from last year’s four-day holiday-shopping weekend was 29%, iovation reported.”

“Like other luxuries once restricted to the wealthy—cellphones, private airport lounges and French handbags—metal credit cards have trickled down the income stream. Capital One Financial Corp. and other banks have added metal to some of their credit cards with the idea that the hefty feel makes customers feel special and maybe spend more. Customers typically can’t ask their bank to swap out their plastic cards, but at least 20 types of credit cards in the U.S. contain metal, including offerings from JPMorgan Chase & Co., Citigroup Inc., and Wells Fargo & Co.”

“Grab, Southeast Asia’s leading everyday super app today announced the launch of GrabPay Card, Asia’s first numberless card that offers users unparalleled card security, access to an expanded rewards ecosystem and hassle-free Grab payments integration in order to bring cashless convenience to millions in Southeast Asia.”

“Today the PCI Security Standards Council (PCI SSC) published a new data security standard for solutions that enable merchants to accept contactless payments using a commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) mobile device (e.g., smartphone or tablet) with near-field communication (NFC). Using the PCI Contactless Payments on COTS (CPoC™) Standard and supporting validation program, vendors can provide merchants with contactless acceptance solutions that have been developed and lab-tested to protect payment data.”

“With this new agreement, Envestnet I Yodlee is committing to send 100% of its requests for Chase customer data through the bank’s secure API, or application programming interface. This will ensure the apps can receive Chase customer data they need while customers control what’s shared with whom…Because the secure API uses a token-based approach, customers will no longer need to give out their username and password – confidential credentials that should always be treated with the utmost care. Chase now has signed data agreements with a number of leading aggregators and fintechs, including Finicity and Intuit, maker of TurboTax, QuickBooks and Mint.”

“Visa Inc. (NYSE: V) today announced plans to launch a new certification program and fund up to 500 scholarships, available to qualified applicants, that can be used toward obtaining this new professional certification. Visa’s new certification program is designed to train individuals as dispute resolution professionals, a role that is currently in high demand across the payments ecosystem.”

“MoneyGram International, Inc. (NASDAQ: MGI ), a global provider of innovative money transfer services, today announced the expansion of its debit card deposit service internationally which it launched in collaboration with Visa through Visa’s real-time1 push payments platform, Visa Direct. This service is now available to Spain and the Philippines. As a result of the launch, MoneyGram is the first company in the industry to enable cross-border transfers from the United States using Visa Direct. The company expects to launch the service to additional countries in the coming months.”

“Xiaomi, the top smartphone vendor in India , today joined a growing wave of fintech startups in the nation that are offering credit to aspirational young professionals and millennials. The Chinese electronics giant said today it is launching Mi Credit, its curated marketplace for digital lending, which offers users credit between Rs 5,000 ($70) and Rs 100,000 ($1,400) at “low” interest rates. Prior to its availability in India, Mi Credit was launched in China.”

““Data security, starting with encryption and access management, is an important part of the mix. As data migrates away from the enterprise premises and to the cloud, network security is no longer sufficient to protect data. Financial services need new data security methods to protect precious data everywhere in today’s digital IT landscape.” – Frank Dickson, Program VP, Security & Trust at IDC”

“With Fraud Detector (in preview), AWS customers provide email addresses, IP addressees, and other historical transaction and account registration data, along with markers indicating which transactions are fraudulent and which are legitimate. Amazon takes that information and uses algorithms — along with data detectors developed on the consumer business of Amazon’s business — to build bespoke models that recognize things like potentially malicious email domains and IP address formation. After the model is created, customers can create, view, and update rules to enable actions based on model predictions without relying on others.”

“Jack Henry & Associates, Inc. (NASDAQ: JKHY ) is a leading provider of technology solutions and payment processing services primarily for the financial services industry. Today, the JHA Payment Solutions™ group has announced iPay CardPaySM, an enhancement to its consumer bill pay product that enables financial institutions to provide near-real-time card-funded bill payments using credit and debit cards as an alternative funding option.”

“The Accredited Standards Committee X9 Inc. ( X9 ), a non-profit organization that develops standards for the financial services industry, has reconstituted X9F5, the working group that originally developed the standards on which modern Public Key Infrastructures (PKIs) are based. The decision by the X9 board was based upon the recent findings of an X9 PKI Study Group, which recommended that X9F5 be tasked with creating new PKI standards based on use cases and requirements developed and maintained specifically for the financial services industry.”

“Shift4 Payments Inc., one of the nation’s biggest independent sales organizations, announced on Tuesday that it has filed a draft registration statement with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission for what it calls a “proposed” public offering. A Shift4 spokesman did not immediately return a call from Digital Transactions News seeking comment on the move, but the 20-year-old, Allentown, Pa.-based company’s announcement comes as valuations for publicly held processors and ISOs are soaring, according to recently released data.”

“Rapyd — a London-based startup that has built an API that lets customers tap into a range of financial services spanning payments, checkout, funds collection, fund disbursements, compliance as a service, foreign exchange, card issuing and soon logistics across a wide range of geographies — has picked up an additional $20 million. Rapyd’s valuation with the funding is now at $1.2 billion (up from just under $1 billion in October).”

“Bill.com is a unicorn among unicorns. The company’s IPO filing shows no scandals, no excesses, no exaggerated market sizes, no made-up metrics and no founder control. In comparison to recent unicorn IPO filings such as Uber and WeWork , Bill.com seems pretty unexciting—except that it appears to be a well-run, growing business. In this age when even companies with “Boring” in their name are outlandish , a good, solid, boring business makes Bill.com stand out.”

“Cyber Monday — the final day of the extended Thanksgiving weekend that traditionally kicks off holiday season spend — broke another e-commerce record: US shoppers racked up a total of $9.2 billion in online sales, according to figures from Adobe . To put that number into some perspective, at its peak, consumers were spending $11 million per minute; this was the first day to see sales via smartphones break the $3 billion mark; and this was $1.3 billion more than shoppers spent on Cyber Monday a year ago (remember the days when breaking $1 billion was a big deal?).”

“Prices for Federal Reserve payment services to depository financial institutions will go up by an average of 2.4% on Jan. 2 under a new fee schedule approved last week by the Federal Reserve Board of Governors. The Fed estimates Check Services customers will see average price increases of 3.3%. Users of the Fedwire Funds Service will pay 3.7% more, while FedLine Solutions customers can expect to pay an average of 2.9% more. Fees will remain unchanged for the FedACH [automated clearing house] Service, National Settlement Service, and Fedwire Securities Service.”

“This is a story about a small, dedicated burglary crew, one almost stubbornly set in its ways. Its members work with the stealth and finesse of a demolition team — resembling one, in fact, with their tools of blunt force.”

“When Oliver Hicks finished helping his family with yard work last summer, his dad handed him $50 in cash. Oliver didn’t want it. He asked his dad to send him the money through an app on his phone. “He was like, ‘What do you mean? There’s $50 in cash right in front of you. Why don’t you want it right now?’” recalls Oliver, a 20-year-old sophomore at Swarthmore College in Pennsylvania.”

“The new research, Mobile Payment Authentication & Data Security: Encryption, Tokenisation, Biometrics 2019-2024 , shows that the availability of dedicated biometric hardware will not be an obstacle to biometric usage as it will be present on an estimated 90% of smartphones by 2024. However, we expect less than 30% of these phones to be used to authenticate contactless payments, thanks to the presence of contactless cards.”

“ABN AMRO has temporarily shut down 470 cash dispensers with immediate effect. This emergency measure is needed in view of the growing number of violent ATM explosive attacks. All cash has been removed from the machines. The past few months have seen a sharp rise in violent ATM explosive attacks, particularly targeting a certain type of cash dispenser used by ABN AMRO. The attacks are causing anxiety and unrest among inhabitants and businesses in the vicinity of the ATMs. As ABN AMRO puts the safety of the neighbourhood first, it has decided to shut down all cash dispensers of this type with immediate effect.”

“Since 1959, BVI has relied on the United States Dollar as its national currency for business and consumption. In partnership with LIFElabs.io, the government is looking to implement a central digital currency powered by LIFEtoken pegged 1:1 against the United States Dollar for use within the territory. It is expected that this transition will reduce transactional fees, increase transaction speed, and be accessible to BVIslanders and tourists alike.”

“Today, Amazon Web Services, Inc. (AWS), an Amazon.com company (NASDAQ: AMZN), announced that Klarna has selected AWS as its preferred cloud provider. Klarna, the leading global disruptor of payments, banking, and retail shopping, is leveraging AWS’s proven scalability and security, as well as its unmatched portfolio of cloud services, to provide its teams with the ability to innovate at a faster pace while maintaining regulatory compliance and protecting customer data.”

“New data from Juniper Research forecasts that mPOS (Mobile Points of Sale) transaction values will exceed $1.9 trillion by 2024, up from $850 billion in 2019. This growth will be driven by service adoption from new business users, including pop-up stores and street vendors, for whom the acceptance of card payments was previously inaccessible.”

“We were waiting for an acquirer for the MIR card to be established in the UK. Demonstrating the potential of Russia’s financial services abroad is extremely important. Today, increasing the number of companies connected to acquiring, creating the appropriate infrastructure and assisting in connecting new organisations in the United Kingdom is one of our most important tasks,” said Boris Abramov, Russian Trade Representative in the UK.

“Meet Pixpay , a French startup that wants to replace cash when you’re handing out pocket money to your kids. Anybody who is older than 10 years old can create a Pixpay account, get a debit card and manage pocket money. Challenger banks are nothing new, but they’re still mostly targeted towards adults. If you want to create an N26 or Revolut account, you need to be at least 18 years old. You can create a Lydia account if you’re at least 14 years old with parental consent.”

“Credit unions, long seen as a humdrum corner of consumer finance, are going toe-to-toe with the biggest financial institutions. Credit unions’ assets have grown at nearly twice the pace of banks’ over the past decade, and the cooperatives are buying small banks in record numbers. One recently partnered with Google on its plans to create a checking account .”

“Fintech startup Revolut is adding a key feature for users who want to replace their traditional bank account altogether. You can now pay with GBP direct debits. Revolut already added EUR direct debits last year . While most people use cards to pay for goods and services in the U.K., some businesses require you to pay with direct debit. It can be a utility bill, a gym membership or a phone contract for instance.”

“The country is actively taking on multiple initiatives to get businesses to leverage viable solutions that could help automate operational processes and achieve digital proficiency. In particular, the government has prioritized digitalization efforts among SMEs to maintain relevance, maximize business efficiency, and increase productivity. There is also a strong focus on digital payment capabilities as the country believes that enabling the service is a crucial first step to digitalization.”

“Our latest forecast shares five, well-researched, and expertise-driven data breach predictions for 2020, along with a Scorecard Rating evaluating our 2019 predictions. Our predictions are rooted in Experian’s history of helping companies navigate more than 30,000 breaches in the last 15 years.”

“The use of passive wearable devices for payments is continuing to take off in Europe, as consumers quickly and easily integrate this relatively new payment method into their daily lives. This year’s wearable transaction figures, in comparision to 2018, showed an eightfold increase. This trend has been widely adopted over Europe as payment-enabled wearables are already available in 26 EU countries, offering over 30 different devices. In Europe, the Netherlands is at the forefront when it comes to wearable payments. A third (33%) of all wearable transactions in 2019 came from the Netherlands, followed by the United Kingdom (18%), Switzerland (8%) and Russia (7%). This includes both active wearables (with a battery) and passive wearables (without a battery), such as bracelets, rings and regular watches.”

“For every 100 people in India, there are only three credit cards. A comparable penetration figure for the U.S. is 320. Statistics like these suggest that India’s first initial public offering of a credit card issuer is either an opportunity with boundless prospects — or a victim of arrested development. Which is it? The upcoming sale of shares in SBI Cards and Payment Services Ltd. will give investors a chance to find out.”

“Launched in partnership with Transport for London (TfL), the feature allows travellers on public transport systems to use Apple Pay without authenticating their payment with Face ID or Touch ID. You can just tap your iPhone or Apple Watch on the card reader and get through those gates quicksmart.”

“Announced during World Pride 2019, the True Name initiative was developed in response to a need for credit, debit and prepaid cards that reflect the true identities of many in the transgender and non-binary communities who are misrepresented when shopping and going about daily life. For these communities in particular, the card in their pocket can serve as a source of sensitivity rather than an affirmation of who they are. BMO Harris will implement the True Name feature for personal ATM and debit cards in December of this year while Superbia Credit Union will enable the True Name feature across their Mastercard portfolios in 2020.”

“In short, global financial services finds itself right in the middle of the “ Uber moment ” I predicted four years ago. But while these numbers sound alarming and indicate that consumers and small business will lose out, we should rejoice that the practices of banking models of the past, which have lost the trust of so many, are coming to an end.”

“The latest wave of tech-based financial startups have a new angle on the banking sector: They’ll assume that everyone is out of money, then try to monetize their brokeness. So-called neo-banks , or challenger banks, have been all the rage in Europe and Australia for the past few years. Now they’re starting to get attention here in the US, with names like Chime, Varo, SoFi, Current, GoBank, and even—heaven help us— booyah! . Yes, the exclamation point is part of the name. Like Yahoo!. Cutting edge, I know.”

“British lender NatWest has launched a digital bank to compete in the U.K.’s thriving fintech space. NatWest — a subsidiary of RBS — launched cloud-based bank Bo on Wednesday, with the service going live on both Apple’s App store and Google Play.   Those who sign up to the digital bank will be sent a bright yellow Visa card and access their account via Bo’s mobile app.”

“A central fraud pot used to pay back blameless bank transfer scam victims which was due to run out of money at the end of the year will now be funded until the end of March. Seven banks, which account for the vast majority of UK current account customers, agreed in May to cover a refund system which would reimburse victims of authorised push payment scams in instances where neither the victim nor the bank was to blame.”

“Cash is still king in Japan partly because the nation’s low crime rate makes it safe to carry and use bank notes. Promoting cashless transactions is one way for the country to boost productivity and deal with its chronic labor shortage as its population grays and declines. The government’s cashless incentives are part of a wider set of measures aimed at smoothing out consumer demand before and after the sales tax increase. A previous hike in 2014 triggered a 7.3% contraction of the economy as spending dived after the increase.”

“Netherlands-based supermarket giant Ahold Delhaize has opened Lunchbox, a low-cost cashierless store that lets consumers “shop a small format store in seconds by scanning in, shopping and walking out”. The concept is being piloted at the Massachusetts offices of the company’s Retail Business Services division in the USA. “Lunchbox is an easy, fresh shopping alternative,” says Paul Scorza, Retail Business Services’ CIO.”

“Following the success of its Instant Transfer feature in the U.S., PayPal and Mastercard recently extended the service to Mastercard cardholders in Singapore and a number of European countries. Mastercard Send™ is an application that leverages the card network infrastructure to facilitate the secure availability of funds in real-time*. With Mastercard Send™, PayPal users can transfer their account balances to eligible Mastercard cards seamlessly and conveniently, typically within seconds*. Since 2017, this service has allowed millions of Mastercard cardholders to transfer their PayPal balances to an eligible Mastercard card.”