PYMNTS
JANUARY 22, 2018
No one likes watching ads, and many will go to great lengths to avoid them, including subscription services, time-shifted viewing and pop-up blockers, to name but a few. That’s a big problem for a media industry that is largely fed by advertising revenue. “Hollywood is in trouble,” Federico Pacquing, Reedeux’s founder and CEO, noted. “Over the last decade, the way consumers consume media has changed dramatically.
Katz,Sapper&Miller
JANUARY 25, 2018
When designing its tax reform bill, Congress did not overlook tax-exempt organizations. The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017 (TCJA) includes provisions relating to unrelated business taxable income, executive compensation, and investment income. Beyond the impact the new law has on tax-exempt organizations, individual donors' charitable giving will also be affected.
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PYMNTS
JANUARY 26, 2018
Sometimes eCommerce retailers need to verify a customer’s identity at checkout, but the authentication process often leads to lost sales. Methods like a one-time password sent by text message (SMS), for example, can cause many consumers to abandon their online shopping carts. Customers are more inclined to go through with a purchase when retailers use alternate authentication methods.
PYMNTS
JANUARY 22, 2018
The mobile devices in consumers’ pockets are getting smarter, and consumers are increasingly using those intelligent capabilities to manage their money. Now, banks are turning to use artificial intelligence (AI) to help consumers make smarter choices by providing actionable financial insights. In the January edition of the Digital Banking Tracker , powered by Feedzai , PYMNTS explores the latest developments surrounding new financial management solutions that are being powered by AI. .
Advertiser: Paycor
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PYMNTS
JANUARY 26, 2018
Enterprise software company CapLinked is rolling out a way to secure data stored on blockchain platforms. This week, the company announced the launch of TransitNet, a blockchain framework to protect digital assets and data stored on blockchain for enterprise clients. Companies can deploy the protocol via application program interface (API), CapLinked explained in a blog post , to secure transactions and data surrounding key enterprise deals like M&A, licensing, financing and more.
PYMNTS
JANUARY 22, 2018
Technology services, merchant services, payments processing: These terms woefully minimize the range of needs merchants face in today’s mobile, digital world — and they often fall short of accurately describing the solutions innovators are bringing to market to help merchants maximize their potential. That potential, said Shane Happach, head of Global Enterprise eCommerce at Worldpay , lies at the center of the blurred lines that now define commerce.
Accountant Advocate brings together the best content for small business accounting professionals from the widest variety of industry thought leaders.
PYMNTS
JANUARY 24, 2018
The financial services industry is no stranger to innovation, but it increasingly appears that change in the space is being driven by outsiders instead of the financial heavyweights. For several years, upstart challengers, rather than traditional banks, have been pushing a wide range of tech-powered financial innovations aimed at addressing the needs of consumers and companies alike.
PYMNTS
JANUARY 23, 2018
Four years after Stripe began accepting bitcoin, the payments platform has decided to end support for the popular cryptocurrency. The company said bitcoin’s volatility and lengthy transaction times led to its decision, TechCrunch reported. The policy will not take effect immediately, as the company plans to end support for bitcoin on April 23. Stripe had started accepting bitcoin in 2014, when the cryptocurrency first reached $1,000 and truly gained traction.
PYMNTS
JANUARY 23, 2018
The Bank of America has reportedly done away with a free checking account that was popular among low-balance customers, forcing them to save more money with the national bank or face a monthly fee. According to a report in The Wall Street Journal , all of the customers that still had eBanking accounts were moved to bank accounts that charge a $12 fee each month if they don’t have at least $250 directly deposited into the account or if they don’t maintain a daily balance of at least $1,500.
PYMNTS
JANUARY 22, 2018
Due to high risks and “insufficient” protection, the Nordic region’s largest bank will ban its approximately 31,000 employees from trading in cryptocurrencies such as bitcoin, the company said on Monday (Jan. 22), according to news from Reuters. “The risks are seen as too high, and the protection is insufficient for both the coworkers and the bank,” a Nordea spokeswoman told Reuters.
Speaker: Victor C. Barnes, CPA, MBA
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.
PYMNTS
JANUARY 24, 2018
Call it agility. Or, in a more long-winded fashion, that nimbleness which brings together new and existing rails, melding legacy systems with new layers of functionality. Done right, such integration enables participants in the payments ecosystem to accommodate payment flows across mobile conduits, account-to-account, person-to-person, person-to-merchant and any number of permutations yet to even be realized.
PYMNTS
JANUARY 23, 2018
Food order-ahead mobile apps are exceedingly good at calculating the best route for drivers, but they don’t always keep consumers informed about the status of their orders in real time, according to Lee Leet, chief executive of QSR Automations, Inc. Customers want to be kept aware of potential delays to their orders and “when their food [is] going to be ready so they’re not sitting outside … with the car running, waiting to pick up an order because it’s running a little late,” Leet told PYMNTS.
PYMNTS
JANUARY 26, 2018
Walmart will be laying off as many as 1,000 employees at its headquarters this year and in 2019. Bloomberg reported news that between 400 and 500 jobs were cut this week in marketing, human resources, merchandising, real estate and other departments. Those employees have 60 days to find new positions. The next round of layoffs, less than 500 positions, will happen next year, as some buildings are consolidated in anticipation of the company’s new corporate headquarters, which will be located abou
PYMNTS
JANUARY 25, 2018
Many cities have bus systems, but they’re not always well-utilized by the majority of residents. The city of Arlington, Texas, located just outside Dallas, for example, had a single bus route — and discovered that most of its riders were students at the University of Texas branch there. So, late last year, Arlington voted to end the route and replaced it with a ridesharing service in December.
Speaker: Kim Beynon, CPA, CGMA, PMP
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.
PYMNTS
JANUARY 26, 2018
More than $150 million in venture capital bolstered the B2B FinTech market this week, and while investors made big steps into areas like human resources, fleet management and artificial intelligence (AI), it was an old favorite that saw the most, and largest, investment rounds: alternative lending. Once again, alternative finance, or AltFin, proves its staying power, especially across Asia.
PYMNTS
JANUARY 22, 2018
Charles Babbage is considered “the father of the computer.” But it was Lord Byron’s daughter, the mathematician Ada Lovelace , who wrote the first algorithm that made computing machines more than just fancy calculators. Sir Edmund Hillary is the first person to have reached the top of Mt. Everest, and was knighted for that achievement. But it was his Sherpa, Tenzing Norgay , who carried the equipment, prepared the route and took the risks to make sure that Hillary reached the summit
PYMNTS
JANUARY 22, 2018
Royal Dutch Shell is boosting its position in the world of blockchain through an investment in distributed ledger startup Applied Blockchain. According to Forbes reports , Shell’s trading unit, Shell Trading International, secured a minority stake in the U.K. startup, which develops blockchain apps with a focus on smart contracts. Existing clients include corporations across a range of verticals, like the telecom and manufacturing sectors, but the publication noted that Shell’s inves
PYMNTS
JANUARY 24, 2018
Bitcoin doesn’t necessarily have the blessing of government agencies, but what about blockchain? It seems governments are a bit more open to distributed ledger technology (DLT), though that doesn’t mean blockchain companies get a free pass with regulators. The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) recently made that clear with news this week that the agency would crack down on businesses using the blockchain name to boost shares, a recent phenomenon in the market hitting everything from
Speaker: Mark Gilham, FCCA, CPP
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.
PYMNTS
JANUARY 22, 2018
Many, but not all, cars meet Uber and Lyft’s standards. With Uber, for example, cars must have four doors and be newer than 15 years old to operate on their platform. Lyft has similar requirements, too, although cars must be no older than 12 years on its platform, unless a driver operates in certain coverage areas. But some would-be rideshare drivers, who might be driving a two-door coupe or an older used car, might not meet those requirements.
PYMNTS
JANUARY 26, 2018
Three big Silicon Valley venture capital firms want to invest in Telegram ’s initial coin offering (ICO), The Financial Times reported. Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, Benchmark and Sequoia Capital have each told the messaging startup that they want to invest $20 million, according to three individuals familiar with the deal. Sequoia and Kleiner declined to comment, and Benchmark did not respond to requests for comment from the Financial Times.
PYMNTS
JANUARY 25, 2018
The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) has extended the effective date on its 2016 prepaid card rule, among other modifications announced today (Jan. 25). The rule, initially passed, also modified requirements for the prepaid card industry in regards to official procedure on lost or stolen cards, error resolution and investigation, fee disclosures, access to account information and overdraft features, if offered in conjunction with prepaid accounts.
PYMNTS
JANUARY 24, 2018
The U.K.’s new Open Banking rules, which enable FinTechs to branch into the mainstream banking industry, are being held up as big banks delay making the changes. According to news from Reuters , six of the nine banks that have to open up their data , so FinTechs can go after their customers with products and services, asked the regulator in the U.K for more time implementing the Open Banking rule.
Advertiser: Paycor
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PYMNTS
JANUARY 24, 2018
Workers in the gig economy don’t always get paid as quickly as they’d like. Drivers for Uber, for example, have their payments calculated on a weekly basis that begins and ends each Monday at 4:00 A.M. Lyft, too, calculates driver payments on a weekly basis. If a driver takes a fare after the cut-off time on either platform? Well, that payment is calculated for the next week — unless drivers take advantage of special programs.
PYMNTS
JANUARY 23, 2018
It appears consumers worldwide are migrating to voice, according to the latest edition of the Capgemini Consulting Digital Transformation Institute Conversational Commerce survey. Based on the results of conversations with 5,000 consumers in the U.S., France and Germany, the survey found 40 percent of consumers plan to use voice assistants as a substitute for apps or mobile sites within the next three years.
PYMNTS
JANUARY 25, 2018
There’s a road — literally — from analog to digital. Think stamped metal translated into bits and bytes, helping to transform a part of the auto industry that has been around for more than a hundred years: license plates. In the process, might the age-old frustration of standing in line at the DMV, shuffling papers, paying by (gasp!) paper check all be transformed along the way?
PYMNTS
JANUARY 22, 2018
Small and medium-sized business (SMB) financing company Trade Finance Solution (TFS) is expanding its offering through a new acquisition. The company announced Friday (Jan. 19) in a press release that it had reached an agreement to purchase Paragon Financial Group, an invoice financing firm. TFS aims to use the takeover to continue expansion across the U.S. and link Paragon’s existing clients to its own offerings.
Speaker: Cheryl J. Muldrew-McMurtry
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.
PYMNTS
JANUARY 24, 2018
Ripple sold nearly $92 million of its XRP digital currency in the fourth quarter of 2017, according to news from CNBC. The company, which is developing a payments system for banks based on the blockchain, sold $91.6 million worth of XRP during the quarter, capitalizing on a 29,631 percent price surge in 2017. Over a year, trading volume jumped from $2.28 million a day in the fourth quarter of 2016 to $807 million during the fourth quarter of 2017 — an increase of more than 35,000 percent.
PYMNTS
JANUARY 25, 2018
Nine West and its creditors are close to reaching a deal that would result in the struggling clothing store filing for bankruptcy and selling some of its assets. Citing people with knowledge of the negotiations, Bloomberg reported news that the deal aims to restructure the company’s nearly $1.5 billion debt. Part of those negotiations would include Nine West selling off parts of the company.
PYMNTS
JANUARY 24, 2018
Facebook is expanding its artificial intelligence pedigree by hiring an IBM executive. According to a report in CNBC , Jérôme Pesenti, who led the development of the Watson platform at IBM, will join Facebook as the vice president of AI. Pesenti was most recently at the European company BenevolentAI. Executives from Facebook’s Artificial Intelligence Research group ( FAIR ) and its Applied Machine Learning group will report to Pesenti.
PYMNTS
JANUARY 22, 2018
Walmart wants to make online food shopping easier by creating clearer images of the products consumers are looking to buy. Today, stock images are a typical sight in the eCommerce arena, which the experts agree is likely dampening the sales of online grocery orders. Consumers like convenience, but they also like to be able to interact physically with the food they desire before they actually purchase it.
Speaker: Frank Taliano
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.
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