Digital wallets

The rocky journey and abrupt end of the technology company's fledgling buy now/pay later service underscores ongoing challenges facing fintechs that offer point-of-sale installment loans, and how banks may benefit from the changing BNPL ecosystem.

Sophia Goldberg, CEO of the startup Ansa, is a self-described payments nerd. She studied this industry for years — and literally wrote the book on payments — before starting her own company to develop digital wallets. In this live session, Goldberg, one of American Banker's Innovators of the Year for 2024, will share lessons on consumer and merchant behavior, and the changes she expects to see.

The San Francisco-based technology company says its new product, Porto, will let investors securely trade more than 200 currencies using multilayered approval systems and biometric credentials.

Amazon Pay — which provides one-click checkout on thousands of e-commerce sites — has added support for Citi Flex Pay, Citigroup's point-of-sale credit card loans, as competition for buy now/pay later customers expands to digital wallets.

The tech giant's planned savings account would receive deposits from the Apple Card's Daily Cash rewards, encouraging users to spend more on Apple's credit card as a way to build their balances.

In the past day, Celsius repaid about $78.1 million worth of USDC stablecoin to the lending platform Aave, according to Etherscan. It also repaid $35 million worth of the stablecoin DAI on the Compound platform. 

In a twist on its Goldman Sachs-issued credit card, the technology giant will directly underwrite and hold its buy now/pay later loans through its own subsidiary, cutting out intermediaries.

"Apple may have restricted competition, to the benefit of its own solution Apple Pay," Margrethe Vestagar of the European Commission said. It's an accusation Apple's fought many times across the globe.

Apple Inc. is working on a new service that will let consumers pay for any Apple Pay purchase in installments over time, rivaling the buy now/pay later offerings popularized by services from Affirm Holdings Inc. and PayPal Holdings Inc.

Apple will allow some iPhone users to scan their driver's license and protect it with the same security used for payment cards in Apple Pay.

Transit and parking draw new users to mobile wallets, and Google is expanding both features to add use cases for its payment app.

Apple Inc. phones face scrutiny from Dutch antitrust regulators who are probing whether users get a free choice of financial apps with contactless payments.

Payments technology entrepreneur Will Graylin is launching OV Valet Superkey, a payment card and digital wallet that can initiate touchless payments at more than 90% of all payment terminals. It pairs with an app that supports messaging and live chat functions.

Apple's legal dispute with Epic Games, the publisher of Fortnite, has exposed a potential nuclear option that the Cupertino, Calif.-based tech giant can use against any company that sells online.

The shift to electronic payments during the coronavirus has led to a notable increase in in-app debit card payments—particularly via Apple Pay—along with higher levels of direct debit and P2P debit card transfers.

With its acquisition of Montreal-based Mobeewave, Apple has placed a long-term bet on where it sees the payments industry headed.

Apple Card helped push services-category revenue to new heights for Apple, which reported double-digit growth in its product and services segments for the third quarter of 2020.

Whether they take the form of a mobile wallet or a touch-free credit card, contactless payments are poised to take off as consumers — wary of using terminals and ATMs or handing cards back and forth — change their habits.