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Nearly nine in 10 European consumers using a contactless payment ring say that it is their preferred method for making contactless payments (89%) compared with smartphone payments (49%) and payment cards (44%), according to a Mastercard survey... More
The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) is testing an upgraded version of its SGQR unified QR payment code that will enable merchants to accept QR code payments made using a wider range of local and cross-border payment schemes through a single financial institution rather than having to maintain commercial relationships with individual payment scheme providers... More
Tourists and other foreigners visiting China can now upload digital yuan to the country’s prototype central bank digital currency (CBDC) digital wallet using their Mastercard or Visa credit card... More
Visitors to China can now link their international credit cards, including cards issued by Visa, Mastercard, JCB and Discover, to an Alipay or WeChat Pay digital wallet and use them to make payments for goods and services at merchants across the country... More
Mastercard and HSBC in the UK are piloting a card recycling system that the payments network hopes will become a blueprint for the global card industry... More
The Hong Kong Monetary Authority (HKMA) has officially launched six first-round pilots of a digital Hong Kong dollar or e-HKD with support from 16 banks, payments and technology firms to test the prototype central bank digital currency (CBDC) across a range of use cases including in-store, online and offline payments... More
The Australia and New Zealand Bank (ANZ) is to pilot the use of a prototype central bank digital currency (CBDC) for offline transactions using pre-loaded contactless cards at RMIT University in the Australian city of Melbourne and Southern Cross University in New South Wales... More
Apple users with accounts at two Russian banks will soon be able to attach an NFC payment sticker to the back of their iPhone that enables them to make contactless payments for goods and services with their smartphone... More
The Central Bank of Bangladesh is trialling an interoperable payments system that will enable customers of more than 15 major banks and payment service providers to pay for their purchases by scanning a standardized QR code at a participating merchant’s point of sale with their smartphone... More
Just over half of UK consumers believe that the growing popularity of digital payments is making physical wallets irrelevant (51%) and one in five say they do not expect to carry a wallet or purse within five years (21%), a figure that rises to 38% among millennials, according to a Mastercard survey... More
PARTNER NEWS: Dejamobile has added support for pre-authorizations to its white label softPOS solution, making it possible for merchant service providers, acquirers and payments facilitators to provide hotels, car rental agencies and other merchants with the ability to accept contactless transactions that include a pre-authorization element on a standard Android NFC phone... More
More than eight in ten payment terminals worldwide now accept contactless payments (82%) as the number of outlets accepting card payments globally grew by 2% in 2021 to reach 88m and the number of eftpos terminals increased by 5% to reach 134m, according to research from RBR... More
PARTNER NEWS: Dejamobile has added support for tips to its white-label SoftPOS solution, making it possible for merchant service providers, acquirers and payments facilitators to provide restaurants, hairdressers and other merchants with the ability to accept contactless payments that include a gratuity on a standard Android NFC phone... More
Fitbit users are now able to add Google Wallet to Sense 2 and Versa 4 smartwatches and then use their wearable to make contactless payments in 45 countries, including 7 of the 12 countries where Google Wallet is now available for the first time... More
Mastercard has launched the first contactless payment cards to incorporate enhanced quantum-resistant security features compliant with EMVCo’s newly released EMV Contactless Kernel Specification... More
Nearly nine in ten consumers worldwide have made digital payments using digital wallets, contactless, QR codes, buy now pay later, money transfer apps, cryptocurrencies, biometrics and other digital payment technologies (85%) and more than six in ten say they have increased their usage of at least one digital payment method (61%) in the last 12 months, according to a Mastercard survey... More
Google Wallet has gone live in Azerbaijan, Iceland, Moldova, Qatar, Serbia and South Africa, enabling users to store and use their credit and debit cards, tickets, passes and other digital credentials on their Android NFC devices... More
PARTNER NEWS: Trust Payments has selected Dejamobile as its technology partner for the rollout of a new software-only payments acceptance service that the omnichannel payments leader will be making available to merchants across Europe from later this year... More
Residents of Ethiopia will be among the first in Africa to be able to acquire a dedicated contactless health card that stores their digitised medical data — including their Covid-19 vaccination records — and enables them to make that data available to healthcare professionals without needing an internet connection to access online databases... More
Mastercard has a launched a biometric checkout scheme that sets out standards and requirements for in-store biometric payment solutions enabling consumers to make contactless biometric payments with their face or palm and without needing to use a payment card or mobile device... More
