2.15.19 Your morning briefing

The information you need to start your day, from PaymentsSource and around the Web:

Far from New York
Amazon's investment of about $80 million in India payment technology appears to be paying off as bank support starts to pick up.

Amazon has has partnered with Axis Bank to issue United Payment Interface IDs to link bank accounts to their Amazon apps, reports eastcoastdaily, an Indian publication.

The collaboration should make Amazon shopping and payments much easier and give Amazon another weapon in its international rivalry with Walmart, which extends to India. UPI, which is affiliated with India's government, has helped expand digital payments in a country where cash still dominates.

Simon Dawson/Bloomberg

Face of the ATM
CaixaBank is allowing consumers to use facial recognition in place of PINs to perform ATM withdrawals.

The bank has collaborated with Fujitsu and FacePhi to build the authentication technology, which has debuted in Barcelona and will expand across Spain in the coming year, reports the Financial Times.

Facial recognition has gained steam among payment companies and financial institutions, particularly as a way to vet ID for mobile apps.

Losing money
U.K. ATMs are becoming less common, which could cause a "collapse" in access to cash, the U.K.'s Treasury Committee is warning.

The committee is calling for regulation to shore up cash access, reports Finextra, which adds the the committee is partly following a report from the consumer group Which? The consumer group claims cashpoints are declining at a rate of 488 per month, including 250 free ATMs.

ATMs are often a political hot button in the U.K. with regulators pressuring financial industry mergers over concerns of ATM access.

In the air
UATP and Conferma Pay will partner to offer virtual card payments to airlines and travel agencies.

The companies will produce a one-time number, with transactions reconciled to the central account, which provides user control over purchases, according to a release.

The controls suggest a corporate payment use, with payments tailored to certain channels for specific amounts consistent with business travel policies.

From the Web

Wendy's settles financial firms' lawsuit over data breach for $50 mln
Reuters | Fri February 15, 2019 - Restaurant company Wendy’s has agreed to pay $50 million to resolve a 2016 lawsuit by financial institutions nationwide alleging that the company’s negligence allowed hackers to steal credit and debit card information in a 2015 data breach.

RBS says 50 billion euros-plus of cross-border payments threatened by Brexit
Reuters | Fri February 15, 2019 - The political turmoil surrounding Britain’s departure from the European Union threatens Royal Bank of Scotland’s ability to clear more than 50 billion euros (44.08 billion pounds) per day in cross-border payments, the bank said on Friday.

Iran’s Government Is Using Crypto Startups as Part of Its Blockchain Embrace
CoinDesk | Thu February 14, 2019 - Iran’s central bank is working with a pair of blockchain startups that are developing what could be the groundwork for a new token ecosystem. In January, the Central Bank of Iran unveiled plans for a more comprehensive cryptocurrency program at Tehran’s Electronic Banking and Payments conference.

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