Mastercard Foundry, the innovation hub for product development at the card giant, is creating a new technology-focused position, as it continues its tech investment. The company’s operating expenses in 2023 increased 11% year over year to $11.1 billion, according to Mastercard’s Jan. 31 earnings presentation. Director of innovation The $42 billion card giant’s ideal […]
Whitney McDonald
Source link
IndusInd Bank introduced ‘Indus PayWear,’ a new wearable payment solution, available on Mastercard. These wearables enable users to tokenise their IndusInd Bank cards for tap-and-pay transactions at contactless Point-of-Sale (PoS) terminals worldwide.
Also read: Why IndusInd Bank is a good buy
The company reported, with a mobile app, users can easily set up their cards on the wearable and switch between them. Advanced tokenisation technology ensures transaction security by replacing actual card details with unique ‘tokens.’ Transactions below ₹5,000 can be made with a tap, while those exceeding ₹5,000 require the PIN entry as per RBI guidelines.
Sumant Kathpalia, MD & CEO of IndusInd Bank, stated, “We aim to shape a seamless and secure payment future with innovations like Indus PayWear.” Gautam Aggarwal, Division President, South Asia, Mastercard, commented, “Indus Paywear delivers flexibility, convenience and security, reflecting Mastercard’s commitment to empowering consumers in the digital age.”
The shares were down by 1.18 per cent to ₹1,545.70 on BSE.
Banks are looking for ways to monetize the sharing of consumer data as open banking regulations are passed across the globe. Open banking pushes banks to collaborate with fintechs to share consumer data without friction, Matthijs van Voorst, strategic partnership director at the Netherlands-based $380 billion ABN AMRO Bank, said at the recent FinovateEurope event, noting […]
Vaidik Trivedi
Source link
To ensure that data is handled responsibly, Mastercard uses an established set of data and tech responsibility standards as well as additional senior executive oversight on all generative AI applications. “Financial institutions have an advantage at the starting line when it comes to using generative AI,” Andrew Reiskind, chief data officer at Mastercard, told Bank […]
Whitney McDonald
Source link
Atome, Southeast Asia’s leading digital financial services platform, has partnered with Mastercard to allow Atome Card holders in the Philippines to convert their Atome rewards points into gaming credits via the Mastercard Gamer Xchange (MGX). A first-of-its-kind turnkey solution, MGX facilitates a convenient exchange that helps consumers convert their reward points into gaming credits across nearly 4,000 of the world’s most popular gaming titles.
According to 2023’s Global Digital Report by Meltwater and We Are Social, the Philippines is ranked the world’s No.1 gaming country, with over 95% of internet users in the country between the ages of 16-64 playing online games.
“We’ve seen a very strong take-up for the Atome Card, especially among digital-native Gen Z and millennial users in the Philippines, with one of the top use cases for the Atome Card being online purchases. We see a strong synergy in this partnership with Mastercard’s MGX platform as it provides Atome Card holders and gamers access to a wide range of gaming credit options,” said Magic Tang, Atome head of cards business.
“MGX bridges the world of rewards to the thriving global gaming community, offering an innovative and seamless redemption solution in a new category. From eSports viewers to console and smartphone gaming enthusiasts across a range of demographics, it opens new connections to the world’s fastest expanding entertainment market,” said Kaveri Khullar, senior vice president of consumer marketing & sponsorships at Mastercard. “As the Philippines gaming market anticipates further growth in the next few years, this partnership with Atome is a fantastic example of how innovative payment experiences are evolving to connect consumers to their passions,” she added.
For a limited time until March, gaming enthusiasts can obtain up to PHP2,000 worth of gaming credits when they shop using the Atome Card.
Atome recently launched the upgraded Atome Card, allowing Filipino consumers the ability to shop and buy now and pay later anywhere a Mastercard card is accepted, in-store, online, and even overseas. New features include the ability to choose “Pay in 3” or “Pay in 6” month options.
Upon approval of their Atome Card application, consumers will receive a pre-paid card — which is available as both a virtual and physical card — with a potential spending limit of up to PHP200,000, based on the individual’s credit assessment. Cardholders will be able to view and manage their payment installment schedules within the Atome mobile app.
Consumers in the Philippines can apply for the Atome Card here.
Gadgets Magazine 17
Source link
Mastercard extended its collaboration with The Clearing House today to allow customers and businesses to use real-time payments. Mastercard will be the exclusive instant payments software provider for The Clearing House’s (TCH) RTP network, according to a news release from Mastercard. TCH’s RTP network has been gaining traction since the launch of FedNow, with more […]
Vaidik Trivedi
Source link
Update 12/24/23: New code FLASH2023 for 100% off purchase fees on cards $50 or higher, valid through 12/26. (ht GCG)
Same deal being offered for VanillaGift & AmEx giftcards.
William Charles
Source link
Whitney McDonald
Source link
Vaidik Trivedi
Source link
Fearless Fund’s Strivers Grant Program was already in danger before Edward Blum’s American Alliance for Equal Rights sued it in August, according to documents reviewed by TechCrunch.
In June, just two months before the lawsuit was filed, the foundation arm of the fund held a company offsite in which it marked the Strivers Grant Program, sponsored by Mastercard, as being “at risk.” The briefing document noted that Mastercard cut funding to the program after the organization initially made a five-year pledge to give money to Black founders. According to the document, Mastercard was “no longer passionate about the original cause.”
It also noted that there were many department changes within Mastercard, though it is not immediately clear how this affected funding for the grant. The news comes as the grant faces a historic lawsuit by the AAER, which alleges that the Strivers Grant discriminates against non-Black founders by only offering grant money to Black women. A judge has issued a temporary injunction against the grant, meaning Fearless Fund is barred indefinitely from awarding it.
In a response to TechCrunch, Arian Simone, the co-founder and CEO of Fearless Fund, did not directly address whether the fund was still working with Mastercard. “We have given women of color the access to capital that’s historically been unavailable to them,” she said. “Our partnerships with companies, including Mastercard, have given these women a chance to realize their entrepreneurial dreams.”
Mastercard also did not directly address whether it was still working with Fearless Fund, but said that there’s been “no change in the commitments we have made, including our long-standing support of small business owners, entrepreneurs and underserved communities. Our work, products, and services help to drive their growth, protect them from fraud, and create more opportunities for us all.”
Mastercard and Fearless Fund partnered in 2021 to launch the Strivers Grant Program, with the goal of providing Black women-owned small businesses grants and access to mentorship. This was part of Mastercard’s “Strivers Initiative,” which was launched to help highlight Black women business owners. In 2020, Mastercard announced a $500 million commitment to investing in the Black community to help close the racial wealth gap. The organization followed many others at the time who were under a lot of pressure to start supporting the Black community in the wake of George Floyd’s murder.
As of this year, Mastercard’s grant with Fearless Fund sought to award four Black women $20,000 throughout the year; the last entry period was set to close just days before the AAER filed its suit, we previously reported.
The briefing document showed that back in June, Fearless Fund planned to revamp the grant and that there was an “MC strategic planning” around the month of October, where they hoped to help Mastercard “feel special” and to “fuel ego.” Fearless Fund wanted two more years of the partnership, per the brief. That same month, TechCrunch wrote that the venture arm of Fearless Fund announced a multimillion-dollar follow-on round for its second fund, with Bank of America, Costco and Mastercard as investors. It is unclear whether AAER’s lawsuit against the grant has affected its relationship with Mastercard or the other investors and partners with whom Fearless Fund works.
Dominic-Madori Davis
Source link
Updated Nov. 28, 2023 12:54 am ET
Broadcom Chief Executive Hock Tan shelled out $40,000 to sit at Xi Jinping’s table for the Chinese leader’s recent dinner in San Francisco with the heads of American businesses. Tan had a lot more at stake—a $69 billion deal he was waiting on China to approve.
For months, Chinese regulators wouldn’t clear the U.S. chipmaker’s bid to buy enterprise software developer VMware, leading Broadcom to put off its date for completion of the deal—first announced in May 2022—three times. Beijing had held up previous mergers involving U.S. companies. Intel’s planned acquisition of Israeli firm Tower Semiconductor, for more than $5 billion, was scuttled in August after Chinese regulators failed to approve it.
Copyright ©2023 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved. 87990cbe856818d5eddac44c7b1cdeb8
This is a story about you and your favorite credit card, the one that earns you points. You use your card for everything. You pay off your balance every month. And you watch with glee as your rewards grow and grow and grow. And when it’s time to cash in, you announce that you’re going to get a family gift. And each member will get one vote. And then your daughter argues that the family needs another iPad. And your son has fallen in love with the ugliest garden gnome that you’ve ever seen. And so to break up the skirmish, you decide that you’ll be getting the frying pan. Because what brings the family together more than food? Marty is the answer. But let’s keep him out of this. And when they complain and say, “But that’s not what I wanted,” you look them in the eye and say, “This was never about you.” “It’s about us, all of us.” And then two weeks later your frying pan arrives. And you can’t help but smile because you kind of did get this for yourself, though you’ll never admit it. And you’re looking at the frying pan. And it’s staring at you and you at it and it at you and you at it. And you just have this split second where you think to yourself: Who actually paid for this? Who pays for all of this? Well, if you love your rewards card, then you’re probably not going to like the answer. Because you try to be a good person, you shop locally. And each week you buy, let’s say, $100 in groceries from MJ. When you swipe your card, that $100 doesn’t go straight to MJ. Instead, store owners are charged a series of fees, the largest of which is called the swipe fee. It’s set by the card network, usually Visa or Mastercard. And your bank uses it to pay for your rewards. The swipe fee is usually between 1.5 percent and 3.5 percent of your total. The more premium your credit card, the more that MJ is charged. Now, that might not sound like much. But it can add up. For small businesses like MJ’s, swipe fees can be one of their biggest expenses. And small stores like hers get charged higher rates than big-box competitors. In order to cope, store owners like MJ raised their prices. That means that all of us are paying more. But only those who have special cards are getting rewards. And here’s the catch: The wealthiest Americans tend to have the best cards that give them the most rewards, while poorer Americans are more likely to pay in cash or debit with no rewards or benefits. So what we really have is a system that forces everyone to pay higher prices in order to subsidize rewards that primarily go to the wealthy. So this rewards card, it’s really a screw-over-poor- people card. Every time you use it, you’re contributing to inequality, helping to drive up prices and further squeeze the most cash-strapped Americans, all so that you can get that free frying pan. You’re probably not benefiting from rewards as much as you thought. In 2020, the Federal Reserve found that the average American at every income level loses more to swipe fee price hikes than they earn in rewards. And of course, the poorest Americans are still getting handed the worst deal. On average, they pay five times more in price mark-ups than they’ll ever receive in rewards. Why are we stuck in this system? Why are swipe fees in the U.S. nine times higher than they are in Europe? Why do we have to pay so much just to pay? Well, it’s largely thanks to two companies, Visa and Mastercard. This system is their core business. It’s what they do for a living. And, sure, they’re providing a service and deserve to earn a profit. But these two companies control over 80 percent of the credit card market. With scant competition, Visa and Mastercard have faced little pressure to rein in swipe fees. The truth is for the vast majority of Americans, the best deal might not come in the form of a new piece of plastic but instead a new piece of legislation. That’s because Congress has the power to regulate swipe fees. In fact, in 2010, they did just that for debit cards. Remember the swipe fee on that $100 grocery purchase? If you paid with a debit card, it would have only cost MJ 26 cents. Dick Durbin, the senator who helped crack down on swipe fees for debit cards, has authored a bipartisan bill that would use competition to drive down credit card swipe fees. But the banks and credit card companies are, of course, pushing back. Right now, there are two things that you can do. First, call your senator and encourage them to support this bill. You can go to this website to find their number. Second, if you’re shopping at a small business that you want to support, remember that how you pay can make a difference. Using your debit card can save small businesses a lot in swipe fees. But the best solution might be elsewhere in your wallet. Increasingly, small businesses are offering discounts for cash payers. Avoiding this predatory system can be a win for both of you. And if those rewards are just too good to say goodbye to, well, then at least don’t go around telling people that you’ve never taken a handout, because you have. And the working class is paying for it. [MUSIC PLAYING]
James Robinson and Emily Holzknecht
Source link
Whitney McDonald
Source link
The National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) is exploring ways to encourage payments made via RuPay credit cards linked to UPI (Unified Payments Interface), a medium that has been facing some roadblocks due to slower-than-expected adoption.
The government introduced UPI payments via RuPay credit cards in September last year. While allowing the linkage of RuPay credit cards on UPI has increased the acceptance infrastructure for such cards multi-fold, the biggest drawback is the inability of merchants and banks to differentiate between card on UPI and regular UPI transactions being made via QR codes.
“It was launched in a hurry and it is still a problem because when you go to a small merchant and pay by credit card, they are used to zero MDR. But if a credit card is used they get less money,” a senior payments industry official told businessline.
“Even in the case of bigger merchants, banks have tie-ups for fixed retailer rates but these have gone up because of RuPay and UPI. While these merchants have higher margins, they are also now questioning banks,” they added.
Even as UPI transactions continue to be free, UPI transactions made via linked credit cards attract the same interchange and merchant discount rate (MDR) as any other credit card transaction.
Some sections of the industry also believe that the effective MDR on card UPI transactions is higher than card PoS (point-of-sale) transactions due to the additional layer of intermediaries such as PineLabs which absorb part of the cost for pure card transactions.
The lack of prior classification between the transaction type has led several merchants, especially large offline merchants, to accept such UPI payments without realising the extra charge they attract. As a result, certain payment gateways and banks, at the behest of the merchants, stopped accepting payments via RuPay on UPI.
In response, the NPCI has now gone live with a mechanism, which once integrated by payment gateways and intermediaries, will allow merchants and banks to identify and classify the two types of transactions and accordingly assess the charge.
“NPCI has built the system, it is already live. It includes a return parameter, so if it is a credit card on UPI transaction, it alerts the system that it needs to be treated as a credit card transaction and not UPI,” a source said adding that the update is received both at the merchant and bank end.
NPCI introduced this on an ad hoc basis and the functionality has been live for the past month or so and should be adopted by most payment intermediaries over the next 15-20 days, sources said.
“It was done as an afterthought, so this has left a little sour note. We lost some money which we could have avoided if we had been able to inform the merchants in advance,” said the head of a payments platform that had to pay additional money to banks once credit card on UPI was introduced. He added that it would’ve been smoother if the NPCI had tested the ecosystem before introducing the feature rather than correcting it after launch.
However, fearing lower adoption of or merchant discrimination against RuPay UPI transactions, and to encourage increased adoption, the NPCI is also exploring a fee income-based incentive model where payment gateways may compensate merchants for the higher charges on such transactions compared with the zero charge on regular UPI transactions, a source said.
NPCI has been pushing the issuance and adoption of cards on the RuPay network to reduce the reliance on foreign players such as Visa and Mastercard, and for easy linkages with other products in NPCI’s suite including UPI.
Whitney McDonald
Source link
Mastercard has joined forces with cryptocurrency and NFTs payment application MoonPay, aiming to explore potential integrations and consumer loyalty opportunities within the emerging Web3 ecosystem.
In the atmosphere of the Money20/20 event in Las Vegas, Mastercard and MoonPay have made headlines by announcing their collaboration aimed at bridging the gap between the conventional financial world and the emerging Web3 landscape.
With a focus on cultivating customer loyalty, this partnership is set to leverage Mastercard’s extensive network and MoonPay’s foothold in the cryptocurrency and non-fungible tokens (NFTs) domain.
Visa and Mastercard have been increasingly active in exploring Web3 potentials, diversifying the companies’ interests from stablecoin-based payments to attempts at alleviating Ethereum’s (ETH) gas fees. Mastercard’s recent endeavors with MetaMask and Ledger further underscore its commitment to web3 integration.
By partnering with MoonPay, Mastercard introduces its Crypto Credential system into the equation, promising a trustworthy and regulation-compliant transaction environment. This is complemented by the incorporation of Mastercard’s payment technologies, including Mastercard Send and Click to Pay.
However, this collaboration is not without its points of contention. The volatile nature of the crypto market raises questions about the long-term viability and stability of such partnerships, and the integration of web3, while innovative, also introduces a layer of complexity in terms of security and regulatory compliance, areas that are still in the process of maturation.
Furthermore, while the involvement of Otherlife, MoonPay’s subsidiary, brings a creative and strategic edge to the partnership, it is yet to be seen how these attributes will translate into tangible benefits for the consumer.
Bralon Hill
Source link
Payments behemoth Mastercard has joined forces with JPMorgan Chase to provide customers with a pay-by-bank option.
Pay-by-bank can be used by billers for recurring payments like rent, utilities, health care and tuition, among others, according to an Oct. 20 Mastercard release.
The capability taps into Mastercard’s open banking technology to allow consumers and businesses to safely share their data to easily access a variety of financial services, a Mastercard spokesperson told Bank Automation News.
Telecom service provider Verizon will be the first to use this payment channel for its customers, according to the release, and Mastercard expects more billers to join the payment channel in the coming months.
The card giant is not the only FI getting into pay-by-bank; Bank of America is also exploring expanding its pay-by-bank offering in the United States, although it is already available in the United Kingdom.
JPMorgan Payments has selected identify verification platform Trulioo to help crack down on fraud and other financial crimes.
Vancouver, Canada-based Trulioo will provide JPMorgan with its Person Match and Identity Document Verification solutions to verify a person’s identity and provide business verification, according to a recent JPMorgan release.
“We chose the platform because of its breadth of personally identifiable data sources, impressive match rates and global footprint,” Ryan Schmiedl, managing director and global head of payments trust and safety at JPMorgan, said in the release. “Trulioo has the trusted authentication and verification experience we want to offer clients and additional layers of protection from fraud during the onboarding experience and beyond.”
Trulioo uses data points from 190 countries, including personally identifiable information, government documents, biometrics and business names in order to verify users for its bank customers, Trulioo Chief Product Officer Michael Ramsbacker told BAN.
Machine learning is utilized by the identity verification company’s platform for document auto-capture and AI-driven face detection.
Trulioo raised $394 million in series D round in June 2021 for a $1.75 billion valuation. AmEx Ventures, Citi Ventures and Blumberg Capital participated in the funding round.
Mastercard selected the cross-border payments company Remitly to provide customers with more options to make remittance payments.
Customers can use Mastercard Send, a payment solution by Mastercard, to add their debit card as a payment option on the Remitly app, and receivers of the payment can access their money through multiple channels including mobile wallets, direct deposit or cash pickups, an Oct. 19 Mastercard release stated.
Last October, Remitly teamed with Visa to provide real-time payment options for Canadian customers to send payments to 100 countries using Visa Direct.
Wealthtech giant Envestnet is teaming up with four fintechs:
Envestnet Data & Analytics will provide secure account linking, open banking and multichannel payment rails to provide more financial wealth management tools to customers, according to an Oct. 24 Envestnet release. The wealthtech company will also provide the fintechs with financial datasets to help them provide better financial advice to their customers.
“Data has the power to harmonize and connect all parts of a person’s financial life so that their daily monetary decisions support their long-term goals,” Farouk Ferchichi, group president at Envestnet Data & Analytics, said in the release.
Visit Bank Automation News’ Transactions Database, which lists the technology selected or acquired by companies in the financial services industry, with a specific focus on technology that enhances automation.
Vaidik Trivedi
Source link
Vaidik Trivedi
Source link
AggregatedNews
Source link
Vaidik Trivedi
Source link