Apple Pay goes live in Mexico
Apple Pay has rolled out in Mexico, with support for American Express and for Mastercards issued by the country’s Banorte and Citibanamex banks... More
Retail
Japanese convenience store trials face and palm biometrics for checkout-free shopping
The Green Leaves+ shop-and-go store in the Yokohama Techno Tower Hotel in Japan is piloting a biometrics-enabled checkout-free service that allows customers to enter the store by verifying their identity with just their face and a swipe of their palm... More
Amazon to build digital currency payments solution?
Amazon is recruiting a tech team that will be tasked with building “innovative payment products for customers in emerging markets” that will enable “customers to convert their cash into digital currency” to purchase “goods and/or services like Prime Video”, a job advertisement posted by the company reveals... More
Antelop launches one-stop token service provider hub for digital card issuers
PARTNER NEWS: Antelop Solutions has introduced a unified issuer token service provider hub that enables banks to simply and securely manage every stage of the digital card issuing and management process, from card enrolment to token lifecycle management... More
China’s central bank expands digital yuan pilot to Beijing
The People’s Bank of China has launched the first large-scale giveaway of the country’s central bank digital currency (CBDC) to be held in Beijing and has distributed 10,000m digital yuan (US$1.55m) to 50,000 participants in a ‘red envelope’ lottery... More
Central Bank of Iran to introduce NFC mobile payments
The Central Bank of Iran (CBI) has announced plans to introduce NFC contactless payments in the country, enabling consumers to upload their bank card information to their mobile phone and use their device to make in-store purchases at the point of sale... More
Chinese consumers now make three mobile payments every day
Chinese consumers made an average of three mobile payments a day during 2020, while 98% of the Chinese population consider mobile payments to be their most frequently used transaction method, an increase of five percentage points on last year, a new survey reveals... More
Barclays adds digital receipts to mobile app
Barclays bank account holders in the UK can now automatically receive an itemised digital receipt in their banking app every time they use their debit card to make an in-store or online purchase from a retailer or food outlet that has signed up to support the service... More
Covid-19 pandemic cuts demand for plastic cards
The total value of the global plastic cards market has fallen by US$3bn over the course of the Covid-19 pandemic, with the number manufactured worldwide falling by 19.7% from 37.1bn in 2019 to 29.8bn in 2020, according to the International Card Manufacturers Association (ICMA)... More
Kroger to pilot self-checkout only grocery store in Dallas
US supermarket chain Kroger is to pilot its first all self-checkout grocery store in Dallas, Texas, enabling customers to scan and pay for their purchases without needing to go through a cashier-staffed checkout lane... More
Amazon lets customers pay with their palm at three more US stores
Amazon is enabling customers at three more of its Amazon Go outlets in Seattle, USA, to use a contactless palm scanning device to gain access to the store and pay for their purchases with their palm print... More
Survey: Eight in ten central banks are now actively engaged in digital currency projects
More than four-fifths of the world’s central banks (86%) are engaged in “some form of work” on a central bank digital currency (CBDC), up from “about one third” in 2019, according to a Bank for International Settlements (BIS) survey... More
FCA proposes increase in UK contactless spending limit
The UK’s Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) is proposing to increase the limit for single contactless payments in the country from £45 (US$62) to £100 (US$137) and the limit for cumulative contactless transactions from £130 (US$179) to £200 (US$274)... More
Flipkart lets customers use reward points for in-store payments
Customers of Indian ecommerce giant Flipkart can now use SuperCoin reward points earned by shopping on the platform to make in-store purchases at retail outlets across the country by scanning a QR code at participating merchants... More
Chinese banks launch mobile wallets that let customers transact in digital yuan
At least eight major banks, including Hong Kong-based China CITIC Bank, have now introduced or are in the process of introducing digital wallets that support China’s central bank digital currency (CBDC), according to local media reports... More
Mastercard unveils enhanced contactless payment specifications
Mastercard has announced new specifications for contactless payments that will offer quantum-resistant security via “next-generation algorithms and cryptographic key strengths”, enhanced privacy at the checkout and “help ensure any device truly can be a payment device”... More
BNP Paribas to offer biometric payment cards to premier card customers
BNP Paribas Visa Premier card customers will soon have the option of upgrading to a biometric payment card for an additional fee of €24 (US$29) a year, the French bank has revealed... More
BIS to build proof of concept platform for cross-border CBDC payments
The Bank of International Settlements (BIS) is to develop a proof of concept platform to explore the use of central bank digital currencies (CBDCs) for cross-border payments and has identified CBDCs as one of six “thematic priorities” for the year... More
Fidesmo opens NFCW Expo showcase
NFCW EXPO: Fidesmo, a contactless platform provider that makes it possible for issuers to connect payment, transit ticketing and access control cards to a wide range of both passive and active devices, has opened a booth in the NFCW Expo... More
PBOC to launch third digital yuan trial in Shenzhen
The People’s Bank of China (PBOC) is to follow its pilots of NFC-based contactless digital currency payments with the distribution of a further 20m digital yuan (US$3.1m) in a third ‘red envelope’ lottery to be held in the city of Shenzhen... More
