Samsung Pay has begun rolling out in Malaysia with support from CIMB, Citibank and Standard Chartered, with Hong Leong Bank coming soon... More
Samsung Pay goes live in Malaysia
USA
US banks launch money-transfer app
Nineteen US banks have launched Zelle, the mobile P2P money transfer service unveiled last October to compete with the likes of Venmo, allowing users to send money directly to each other’s bank accounts within minutes... More
Gulf Oil unveils Gulf Pay for mobile payments and special offers at fuel stations
Customers at Gulf Oil fuel stations across select New England and New York markets in the US are to pilot a new mobile payment service that will enable drivers to navigate to the nearest station, pay for fuel at the pump, receive exclusive offers and purchase products inside the convenience store... More
EMV card shipments grow less than 1% in 2016
Global EMV payment card shipments increased by less than 1% year-on-year in 2016, reaching nearly 3bn, ABI Research says... More
Google Home owners get voice commands for grocery shopping
Owners of the Google Home speaker powered by Google Assistant can now buy groceries using voice commands... More
Citi and Wells Fargo cards ‘not supported’ by Android Wear
Credit cards provided by US banks Citi and Wells Fargo are not supported by Android Wear 2.0, Google’s new version of its wearables operating system which brings host card emulation (HCE) based NFC payments to smartwatches... More
Mobile wallet providers ‘failing to realise full potential of loyalty programs’
Mobile financial service providers are failing to fully realise the potential of loyalty programs to drive revenue growth, a survey by customer experience solutions provider Amdocs and consultancy firm Ovum says, while those who employ loyalty programs are “better placed” to increase usage and adoption of their mobile wallet service... More
Half of US and UK consumers want more chatbots
Nearly half of mobile users in the US and UK (49%) say they would like more conversational chatbot and/or SMS messaging options with brands, research released by OpenMarket says... More
US mobile payment transactions to reach $282bn by 2021
The total volume of mobile payment transactions in the US will reach US$282.9bn by 2021, Forrester estimates... More
Google unveils Android Wear 2.0 and new watch with support for NFC mobile payments
Google has officially unveiled Android Wear 2.0, the new version of its operating system for smartwatches, and two new watches from LG — one of which comes with NFC to support HCE mobile payments using Android Pay... More
PayPal launches Slack payments bot
PayPal customers in the US, UK, Australia and Canada can now send money to each other using a PayPal bot on team messaging service Slack... More
Apple Pay most popular mobile payment service among US retailers, survey finds
Apple Pay has the largest percentage of supporting US merchants with 36% accepting the mobile payment service today, up from 16% last year, research released by Boston Retail Partners (BRP) reveals... More
Eight in 10 US consumers would prefer an Amazon Go automated store to traditional shopping
Some 84% of US consumers say they would enjoy shopping at an Amazon Go automated store more than a traditional grocery store, but a fifth think they would lose out on traditional shopping experiences by doing so, the results of a survey of 1,000 shoppers released by packaging solutions provider Shorr Packaging show... More
Google to shut down Hands Free mobile payments pilot
Google is ending its Hands Free mobile payments pilot in one week’s time in order to focus its efforts on “bringing the best of the Hands Free technology to a wider audience,” according to the company... More
Tostitos tortilla chip bags use NFC to order an Uber when consumers are too drunk to drive
US consumers can now order a discounted Uber ride by tapping their NFC smartphone against a bag of Tostitos tortilla chips when they have had too much to drink. The bag detects the presence of alcohol on a person’s breath and shows either a green or red steering wheel to alert the consumer of whether or not they are safe to drive home. More
Starbucks customers get voice ordering as mobile orders and payments continue to grow
US consumers can now place orders from coffee giant Starbucks by speaking into the Starbucks iOS mobile app or to Amazon’s virtual assistant Alexa. The move comes as the company reveals that mobile orders made up 7% of all its US transactions in the last quarter, with mobile payments now accounting for 27%. More
Square cuts processing costs to promote Apple Pay
Mobile POS provider Square is encouraging small traders across the US to promote Apple Pay to customers by letting them process more than US$12,000 worth of Apple Pay payments for free — a saving of $350 in processing costs... More
One fifth of global consumers have made an in-store mobile payment as China leads the way
Nearly one fifth of global consumers (18%) have made an in-store mobile payment in the past six months, representing an increase of 10% from the same period in 2014, research released by trade body Mobile Ecosystem Forum (MEF) reveals. Chinese consumers lead the way, with 38% of them having paid with their phone at the point of sale — nearly double the global average. More
BMO Harris Bank adds P2P mobile payments
Customers of BMO Harris Bank in the US can now send and receive money through People Pay, a mobile P2P payments service added to its mobile banking app... More
Apple Pay records 50% growth in 2016, as mobile apps and websites prove most popular
The number of monthly US Apple Pay credit card transactions conducted in-app, online and at the in-store point of sale grew by 50% between December 2015 and December 2016, research released by consumer spending analytics portal TXN reveals, with mobile apps and websites attracting the highest proportion of transactions... More