Новости за 19.11.2021

Buy now, pay later (BNPL) has exploded in the wake of the pandemic as consumers embrace the freedom it gives them to make multiple interest-free installments. In the U.K., where Swedish giant Klarna’s BNPL service is very popular among shoppers, other players like Laybuy are grabbing a piece of the pie. In an interview with […]

The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) seized $3.5 billion in cryptocurrencies during the fiscal year 2021, accounting for 93% of the assets seized during the year. That’s according to the agency’s annual report on criminal investigations this week, which also outlines some of the more high-profile cybercrimes investigated by the IRS in the past year. Nearly […]

Santa has yet to ride down 34th Street in the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade and the turkey has yet to be carved, but nearly 50% of consumers say they’ve already started making holiday gift purchases amid inventory shortages and rising prices. In the 2021 Holiday Shopping Outlook study, a PYMNTS and Kount collaboration, researchers found […]

Vietnamese B2B eCommerce platform Buy2Sell on Friday (Nov. 19) announced its sales in the first half of the year have tripled year-over-year to $24.5 million, led by food, cosmetics, home appliances and other fast-moving consumer goods.  Through the first three quarters of the year, Buy2Sell reinvested its estimated revenue of about $28 million bacl into […]

The founder of Indian direct-to-consumer (D2C) brand aggregator Mensa Brands on Thursday (Nov. 19) told CNBC that it has become a unicorn — a private company with a valuation of at least $1 billion — and is already profitable after closing a $135 million Series B fundraising round. Falcon Edge Capital led Mensa’s latest funding […]

The widespread shift to remote work is fundamentally changing the procurement process. Historically, businesses have managed B2B payments in centralized offices, where employees could easily exchange paper documents to authorize business expenditures. Today, that is no longer practical — or even feasible. In response, many businesses are striving to digitize their procurement operations. And in […]

It was another big week for cryptocurrency — with news about regulation, crypto-native wallets and a huge new potential for expanded merchant acceptance of crypto. With the announcement that merchants using Verifone terminals can now accept crypto-native wallets at the physical point of sale, crypto continued its move into the mainstream. This points to the […]

Small retailers across the U.S. are having trouble overcoming the supply chain snafus of the past several months, while the nation’s biggest companies — including Walmart, Home Depot, Lowe’s and Target — are finding solutions to work around them, according to a Financial Times report on Friday (Nov. 19). Kohl’s, meanwhile, pointed to “extended transit […]

The cryptocurrency payments provider BitPay says it is offering an early holiday gift to Black Friday shoppers who prefer to pay in crypto.  The company announced Friday (Nov. 19) that it is working with its merchant partners to extend discounts on crypto purchases for the Black Friday shopping season. Some of these deals are available […]

Big Tech firms didn’t have it easy last week, as the European Union clamped down on some of the world’s largest technology companies with hefty fines, warnings and upcoming regulations that are bound to ruffle feathers in the coming weeks and months. Read more: Big Tech Firms Face Tough Week Following EU Clamp-Down In recent […]

Food ordering and delivery platform Grubhub is rolling out its services to the University of Arizona using Yandex Self-Driving Group’s delivery robots — also known as rovers — following a similar launch at Ohio State University in September, according to a press release. The 35,000-plus University of Arizona Wildcats will be able to order from […]

Biometric identity authentication platform authID.ai will get a patent Tuesday (Nov. 23) from the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office for a method that uses various attributes of a person, securely linked to a Primary Account Number (PAN) to authenticate the person’s identity.  U.S. Patent No. 11182777 (“the ‘777 patent”), entitled Systems and Methods Using a […]

Necessity, as they say, is the mother of invention. In the throes of the pandemic, and in the midst of economic upheaval and the need to cast social safety nets wide and far, disbursements made the leap – and are still making the leap – from paper-based payouts to digital conduits. Most consumers are no […]

Uber is introducing a new membership program that bundles rideshares, grocery and food delivery for a monthly fee in exchange for discounts and other perks, according to a press release. The $9.99 monthly Uber One membership, or $99.99 annually, offers 5% off eligible rides and delivery orders, no-charge delivery fees and more. The announcement comes […]

Do you subscribe to the idea that subscription spikes are falling off? If so, then you’re in for a stunner. Consumers are not only acquiring more subscriptions, but they’re now also less likely to cancel them. That’s a relief, at least for the subscription merchants who get it right. Those that don’t could find themselves […]

Home Depot and Lowe’s earnings reports show that home spending is continuing unabated. Plus, retailers move streaming commerce off of social media, and Macy’s becomes the latest retailer to focus on creating a digital marketplace. Data: $10B: Projected annual sales for Macy’s digital business by 2023. 49%: Macy’s two-year growth in digital sales. 60: Number […]

Macy’s CEO Jeff Gennette on Thursday (Nov. 18) told CNBC’s Jim Cramer during an interview on “Mad Money” that the company hasn’t decided whether it will break its eCommerce division into its own company, despite urging from Jana Partners to make the move. Earlier in the day, Macy’s announced it has hired consulting firm AlixPartners […]

Nike on Thursday (Nov. 18) announced the launch of its foray into the metaverse, calling its Roblox-fueled immersive 3-D experience Nikeland. The space allows Nike fans to “connect, create, share experiences and compete,” according to the company announcement. “Nike created this bespoke world with the backdrop of its world headquarters and inside Roblox’s immersive 3-D […]

As social commerce continues to move toward becoming just another way for consumers to shop, social media networks are working to embed shopping even more deeply into their platforms and create new opportunities for purchases. Meta, for example, recently launched new tools on Facebook to allow administrators of groups to set up shops — such […]

Executives at luxury retail platform Farfetch say next year will be a critical juncture in expanding beyond its core marketplace and developing deeper relationships within the industry as an increasing number of brands express interest in the company’s software-as-a-service (SaaS). Earlier this week, for example, PYMNTS reported that Farfetch is in advanced talks with luxury […]

The global health crisis led to a dramatic rise in digital transactions across Latin America, turning the region into the second fastest-growing eCommerce market worldwide — with sales grossing $200 billion in 2020. Approximately 52 million Latin American consumers were projected to head online to make purchases for the very first time last year, more […]

It’s a week before Black Friday, and sales of prepaid gift cards have already started to surge. There are the usual reasons: Nearly 40% of people will be disappointed with at least some of the gifts they get for the holidays this year, resigning themselves to either stuff the items into the back of the closet, regift or head to the store to make a return. And nobody wants to be the […]

After years of decline, department stores are seeing a resurgence in traffic, with Mastercard SpendingPulse projecting they’ll see 40% year-over-year growth over the week of Thanksgiving, and 7.6% growth compared to the same period of 2019. Although department stores are far from their glory days, Steve Sadove, former CEO of Saks Fifth Avenue and an […]

Considering the outsized role technology plays in virtually all manner of innovation today, it should come as no surprise that faster data and better analytics will do the same for payments and banking. This, as cloud-based solutions and data-insights platforms can expand access to financial services for millions of people worldwide who are increasingly going […]

Since the beginning of the pandemic, there have been two categories of merchants in terms of how they have been impacted and how they see the optimization of payment processing, Manuel Huez, vice president, product, payments processing at Checkout.com, told PYMNTS. First, there are those used to selling online. They’ve been there for a while and […]