Incentives news and trends

From BNPL To Wallets, Rising Payment Options Create Clutter, Add Friction
Payment Methods // June 03, 2021

Payments have long been the conduit for new and different experiences in commerce. Look no further than the past year as proof as contactless payments, digital banking and digital wallets gained significant traction. Cryptos, too, of course — and bit by bit, we’re seeing the...

Will Credits Keep Travelers in the Air, on Deck … and Spending?
Travel Payments // March 13, 2020

March 8 will mark a watershed day in the travel industry — when the U.S. state department said that citizens should not take cruises. As Bloomberg reported Friday morning, at least one operator, Carnival, had hoped to keep passengers coming on deck by offering credits of up...

Mastercard, SoFi Team Up On Debit Card, Payment Products
Partnerships / Acquisitions // January 23, 2020

Mastercard and digital personal finance company SoFi have teamed up on a suite of products and experiences to benefit SoFi’s nearly one million customers, the companies announced in a release. The partnership starts with the SoFi Money debit card, an offering that will exist exclusively...

Amex Offers Big Cash Incentives To Businesses To Boost Acceptance
Payment Methods // November 18, 2019

American Express, which has long lagged behind rivals like Visa and Mastercard in terms of business acceptance, has been aggressively pushing to close the gap, offering some businesses thousands of dollars in sign-up fees as well as other incentives, according to a report by The...

Interviews & Exclusives
From BNPL To Wallets, Rising Payment Options Create Clutter, Add Friction

June 03, 2021
Payments have long been the conduit for new and different experiences in commerce. Look no further than the past year as proof as contactless payments, digital banking and digital wallets gained significant traction. Cryptos, too, of course — and bit by bit, we’re seeing the rise of the super app, where transactions are aggregated, secured […]

Building A Challenger Bank That Actually Challenges Traditional Banking

November 06, 2019
There are several reasons why consumers might complain about the services provided by their traditional banks. Perhaps the worst, HM Bradley CEO Zach Bruhnke told Karen Webster in a recent...

Citi: Scaling Open Banking Starts With Incentives And API Aggregation

June 17, 2019
Open banking is nothing if not a lot of moving parts and complications. But could merchant incentives help fuel this ongoing effort at digital payments innovation? That was one of...

Max Levchin: What’s Missing From Today’s Financial Literacy Initiatives

April 29, 2019
By the numbers, Americans are not a very financially literate people.  According to a Standard & Poor’s Global Financial Literacy survey only about 57 percent of the adult population is...

Quick Reads
Mastercard, SoFi Team Up On Debit Card, Payment Products

January 23, 2020
Mastercard and digital personal finance company SoFi have teamed up on a suite of products and experiences to benefit SoFi’s nearly one million customers, the companies announced in a release. The partnership starts with the SoFi Money debit card, an offering that will exist exclusively on the Mastercard network. SoFi’s card will provide an additional […]

Amex Offers Big Cash Incentives To Businesses To Boost Acceptance

November 18, 2019
American Express, which has long lagged behind rivals like Visa and Mastercard in terms of business acceptance, has been aggressively pushing to close the gap, offering some businesses thousands of...

Citi Lures Depositors With Credit Card-Like Perks

May 07, 2019
Citigroup is the world’s largest credit-card issuer, with about 28 million customers, but the gap between its credit business and retail banking has grown larger. To combat this, Citi has...

Amazon HQ2 Secures $51M Funding Vote In VA

March 18, 2019
Amazon.com’s plans to open its HQ2 in Virginia got the support of local officials who approved a financial package valued at $51 million over the weekend. According to NBC News, the...