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Investment bankers in Hong Kong were tricked out of millions of dollars by a cash-advance business called Global Merchant Funding (GMF). According to Bloomberg , smooth-talking fraudster Avery Stone and his partners at GMF convinced bankers from prominent international banks to invest in the business to the tune of $32.5 million before disappearing. “This isn’t a deal that went bad; these guys systematically preyed off their friends,” Thomas Gallagher, a GMF investor, told Bloomberg.
For Immediate Release: For further information, contact: Christine Morrison, (800) 849-6022. Braintree, Massachusetts – Paul McGovern, CPA, and James M. Downey, CPA, of Downey & Company, LLP, an accounting and business consulting firm, recently returned from the Fall Meeting of the National Alliance of Auto Dealer Advisors in Nashville, Tennessee.
Bitcoin wallet iPayYou continues to work toward a future with bitcoin as the default currency. It was just announced that iPayYou has made a way for consumers to pay for items on Amazon with bitcoin, called Amazon Direct. Now iPayYou users can transfer any amount of bitcoin from their bitcoin wallet to Amazon. Customers can use the Amazon Direct tab to the iPayYou platform to determine an amount of bitcoin to transfer and the destination account.
Fact. Digital commerce has been a reality for more than two decades. Fact. The launch of the iPhone in 2007 and the App Store in 2008 opened everyone’s eyes to the impact that mobile would have on payments and commerce. Fact. Twenty years and hundreds of millions of smartphones later, the digital payments experience is anything but consistent anywhere — online, in-store and in-app.
In the climb from contributor to leader, the rules quietly change. But if you’re aiming for the summit, the air gets thinner, and what got you here won’t be enough to get you to the top. 🗻 What made you successful early in your finance career—technical accuracy, sharp analysis, flawless execution—won’t be what carries you to the next level. The higher you go, the more your effectiveness depends on how you connect, adapt, and communicate.
American consumers have fallen for mobile banking apps, but up to now, most businesses were not seemingly showing apps the same love. With the number of mobile banking customers now outnumbering those who bank at branches for the first time, consumers have warmly embraced banking via mobile apps. Despite that, the vast majority of American companies, particularly small businesses, have yet to adopt mobile financial management apps.
Upward and onward seems like a hopeful phrase, doesn’t it? Unless it’s fraud you are talking about. At the end of 2014, the average U.S. household held five mobile devices, while, at the start of 2016, that number has increased to about 13. Tech is a wonderful thing, when used for the forces of good and for quality of life. But alongside that iPad your 10-year-old daughter needed, the rate of online fraud attacks on retailers has doubled, up 137 percent year over year in the first quarter of thi
The holiday season has arrived — meaning sales, snowflakes, good cheer, Christmas carols and fraudsters working day and night to break open your bank account through a variety of creative means. One of this year’s favorites so far, according to reports in The New York Times, has been fake retail and product apps popping up in the Apple App Store of late.
The holiday season has arrived — meaning sales, snowflakes, good cheer, Christmas carols and fraudsters working day and night to break open your bank account through a variety of creative means. One of this year’s favorites so far, according to reports in The New York Times, has been fake retail and product apps popping up in the Apple App Store of late.
As the digital age marches on, we have all learned that the convenience and benefits of the IoT , cloud storage and mobile devices come with a darker side. Chain Store Age just released its predictions for the near future of cybersecurity. Their predictions for 2016 turned out to be accurate, so it’s best to pay attention. Here are the upcoming trends and threats for 2017 and what businesses can do to keep up.
Poland’s startup ecosystem may be considered still in its infancy compared to larger European tech hubs, like London and Berlin, but that doesn’t mean it should be overlooked by entrepreneurs or investors. In this week’s installment of PYMNTS’ Weekly Tech Center Roundup , we look at how the country’s capital city is developing a tech landscape that’s quickly catching up with its western counterparts.
Visa said Monday (Nov. 21) that its latest chip data update showed 388 million Visa EMV cards in the U.S. Of those, the firm said there are nearly 181 million chip credit cards in the field and 208.3 million chip debit cards. The firm also said that there are 1.7 million chip-active locations across the country. The 1.7 million tally, up 191 percent in the past year, represents 37 percent of all storefronts nationwide, according to Visa’s statistics.
Mention “mobile payments,” and many people might immediately answer that they 1) pay with smartphones or other devices but 2) spend much more time bellying up to the register and paying with physical cards or cash. Therein lies a conundrum. The promise of mobile has yet to meet reality, and many retailers find that the lines between channels (hence the term “omnichannel”) are increasingly becoming blurred.
The most overlooked, yet most critical, element of transformation is preparing people for change. Automation and AI aren't just technical upgrades, they’re cultural shifts which can challenge identities. That’s why change management isn’t a side project—it’s the foundation. In finance, where precision and process rule, navigating change can feel especially disruptive.
Singapore-based B2B FinTech firm MC Payment announced a new funding round, as well as global expansion, late last week. Reports Friday (Nov. 11) said MC Payment raised $3.5 million from an investment firm in Thailand, as well as participation from Aura Funds Management, tryb Capital and Perle Ventures. The funds have also allowed the company to enter the Thailand market, reports said.
The seed of FinTech innovation often comes from a desire to do things differently. In B2B payments, that can mean discontent in the way traditional banks and FIs do business or a need for disruptive technologies to come to market faster than banks can offer. But as finance and payments tech expands, these traditional FIs are learning that perhaps the best way to meet the demands of their corporate clients isn’t to compete with FinTech innovators but to collaborate with them.
The U.K. is already a hotbed of FinTech startups, but the government is getting behind it in a bigger way, committing to invest £500,000 a year into financial technology companies. According to a report , the U.K. government is also gearing up to launch a network of regional FinTech envoys as an effort to enhance the country’s status as a leader in FinTech.
In the opening scenes of “The Graduate,” a (supposedly) successful man whispers in Benjamin Braddock’s ear the key to the future: “One word: plastics.” Fast forward 50 years, and that single word could be recast: “One word: FinTech.”. The premise is the same no matter the verbiage. Technology’s inexorable march marches on, and the newest wave is FinTech — the disruptor of the way financials services are rendered and the key to how those services are to be reimagined.
Finance used to be the function that counted, now it's the one that’s counted on. 📊 For accounting firms, controllers, and finance leaders, expectations are rising faster than headcount. Businesses want agile forecasts, granular analysis, seamless reporting, and smart automation—often without added resources while demanding uncompromised accuracy and compliance.
Apple announced that it is expanding Apple Pay to allow nonprofit organizations and charities to accept donations via the mobile payments service and Apple Pay on the Web. The change takes effect immediately in the U.S. Previously, charitable donations were barred on Apple Pay due to a lack of safeguards and the ability to validate the legitimacy of charities accepting donations.
For some businesses, cybersecurity may be an abstract threat. Business owners may think “it won’t happen to me,” or they may be confident in their ability to remain unaffected by a cyberattack. But a new report by Accenture uncovers just how big of a threat cyberattacks are on businesses. According to the company’s latest data , released this week, about one-third of cyberattacks on businesses are successful in their attempts to infiltrate a firm’s existing defenses
Risk has been around at least as long as transactions have been around. How to manage for risk has been a question that has bedeviled firms across the ages. One way to mitigate risk, of course, comes with insurance — and, more specifically, covering the possibility that the other side of a transaction will not deliver on its financial promises. To that end, Fluent, which operates an open account trade platform online using distributed ledger technology (through blockchain), has linked up with Eu
If a chain is only as strong as its weakest link, then a company is only as strong as its weakest competitor. Nowhere does that analogy hold more true than in banking, especially when it comes to earning and keeping a consumer’s trust. It’s been a long road back to strengthening those weak links as banks have weathered the aftermath of the financial crisis.
Great leadership development is the key to sustainable business growth. Are you ready to design an effective program? HR can use Paycor’s framework to: Set achievable goals. Align employee and company needs. Support different learning styles. Empower the next generation of leaders. Invest in your company’s future with a strong leadership development program.
Why make one’s life hard hacking consumer accounts — or taking up armed robbery — when one can get the best of both worlds by directly attacking the banks’ computers and getting ATMs to do things like start spewing cash for no apparent reason? Taiwan and Thailand saw such attacks earlier this year when cyber criminals programmed bank ATMs to spew cash.
In the wake of the fake account scandal at Wells Fargo, companies are rethinking how they compensate salespeople, reported The Wall Street Journal. According to a report, companies are trying to overhaul how they compensate salespeople in an effort to improve customer service and prevent the bad behavior that did Wells Fargo in. Sure, commissions can motivate people to ink deals and boost sales, but they also have risks associated with them.
The biggest dilemma facing innovators isn’t whether what they’re doing will cannibalize what makes them money today but rather getting enough people to try their innovations so that they become mainstream and can make money tomorrow. Getting people to embrace the new — and make it a habit — is very, very hard to do. University of College London researchers conclude that it takes 66 days, on average, for a consumer to do that “something new” each and every single one of those 66 days to totally b
Mobile devices, apps, new technologies have given birth to new platforms that match supply and demand easier than ever before. And the ability to embed payments into those platforms is what has ignited those marketplaces. But how many people participate in the gig economy? How big is it? And what do they do? We were curious, too, and collaborated with Hyperwallet to measure and size the market.
Documents are the backbone of enterprise operations, but they are also a common source of inefficiency. From buried insights to manual handoffs, document-based workflows can quietly stall decision-making and drain resources. For large, complex organizations, legacy systems and siloed processes create friction that AI is uniquely positioned to resolve.
The U.S. Federal Reserve is turning heads for its attention to faster payments, but the Fed has recently announced yet another initiative in the payments innovation space. Last week, the Fed’s Secure Payments Task Force called for comment from industry stakeholders about what challenges they face when it comes to payments security. The task force, made up of about 160 members, will explore areas of payments security, like identity management and data protection, in hopes the survey will he
Cash may be king, but for small businesses, cash is expensive. New research from Sage finds that small businesses in the U.K. are losing out on $11.8 billion every year because of their cash transactions. Those costs can rack up in a number of ways, researchers found. For instance, nearly a quarter of small businesses surveyed by Sage said they had been the target of cash theft by a member of their own staff.
Small businesses may not always be at the forefront when it comes to technology, but when it comes to how its customers pay, most are on board when it comes to mobile payments. That’s according to a new survey commissioned by Samsung Electronics America and conducted by Greenberg Quinlan Rosner Research, which found the majority of small businesses polled said customers want to pay with their smartphones and they expect the use of mobile payments to grow.
A Japanese bank consortium gearing up to create a new real-time payments platform using blockchain technology from SBI Ripple Asia has expanded to 42 members. According to a report , the group launched in August with 15 members, and SBI Ripple Asia had expected to increase the size to 30 banks. “Because of active responses from many financial institutions, the consortium was finally launched with 42 member banks,” said SBI in a statement, according to the report. “Member financ
Speaker: Claire Grosjean, Global Finance & Operations Executive
Finance teams are drowning in data—but is it actually helping them spend smarter? Without the right approach, excess spending, inefficiencies, and missed opportunities continue to drain profitability. While analytics offers powerful insights, financial intelligence requires more than just numbers—it takes the right blend of automation, strategy, and human expertise.
Equity-crowdfunded FreeAgent, a U.K.-based small business accounting firm, has listed on the nation’s AIM stock exchange, the LSE ‘s market for smaller firms. FreeAgent broke ground with the listing but, according to reports, missed the mark on valuation. Friday (Nov. 18) reports said FreeAgent has become the first IPO on the market delivered by an equity crowdfunding platform, Seedrs, which launched a funding campaign for the startup last year.
U.S. prosecutors late last week charged a Florida man in connection with an illegal bitcoin exchange. According to a report by Reuters , Ricardo Hill, 38, was arrested in Florida in October and charged with conspiring to operate an unlicensed money transmitting firm. Hill is linked to an illegal bitcoin exchange owned by a person in Israel that is accused of hacks on JPMorgan Chase.
In this week’s Bitcoin Tracker, bitcoin soars, then settles down and plans for its yearly sale abound. Switzerland gives bitcoin a hand by way of rail ticket machine sales, an Australian startup banks on the aptly named Dash and Zcash fervor fades. The election came and went and, with it, brought some stock market shock. First, they slid way down ( investors don’t like surprises ), then they rose back up a bit.
Shopify’s online store platform is integrating with Sundown AI’s artificial intelligence platform named Chloe. The collaboration is expected to bring enhanced mobile commerce to online stores with the use of voice and text commands. Shopify users will be able to access immediate assistance on their mobile phones via Chloe for any inquires or requests while navigating a store.
Distributed finance teams are rewriting how the back-office runs, and attackers are taking notes. Disconnected workflows, process blind spots, and rising cyber threats are more than just growing pains—they’re liabilities. The challenge isn’t just going remote. It’s building resilient systems that protect accuracy, control, and speed across every transaction and touchpoint.
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