Новости за 04.03.2024

Synchrony has completed its purchase of Ally Lending, Ally Financial’s point-of-sale (POS) financing business. The deal, first announced in January, includes $2.2 billion of loan receivables and a loan portfolio that includes relations with nearly 2,500 merchants and supports more than 450,000 active borrowers in home improvement services and healthcare. “Through this acquisition, Synchrony deepens its presence and reach in the home […]

Point-of-sale financing firm ChargeAfter has debuted an embedded lending platform for banks. The Lending Hub, announced Monday (Mar. 4), is designed to let banks and financial institutions streamline the development, distribution and management of multiple lending products, the company said in a news release. “Banks are seeking to expand beyond their traditional models and integrate their lending […]

Australian FinTech Beforepay has launched a commercial version of its risk management and lending platform. Dubbed Carrington Labs, the new offering gives enterprise clients access to the technology and artificial intelligence (AI) tools powering Beforepay’s lending products, the company said in a Monday (March 4) press release. “Carrington Labs will offer two products,” the release said. “The first is a […]

Artificial intelligence (AI) startup Anthropic said its latest generative AI models outperform those from Google and OpenAI. The Claude 3 family of models, announced Monday (Mar. 4), include versions known as Haiku, Sonnet and Opus, and are purported to be the company’s most powerful chatbots to date. Haiku will be launched soon, while Sonnet and Opus […]

The U.S. Small Business Administration (SBA) has launched an enhanced version of its Lender Match tool that connects small business owners with SBA-approved lenders. The enhanced platform provides a mobile-first user interface that delivers better access and usability, the SBA said in a Monday (March 4) press release. With this platform, small businesses can see […]

Hank Payments has partnered with FinWise Bank to enhance consumer financial services, including lending, savings and payments.  This collaboration brings together Hank Payments’ banking platform with FinWise’s banking solutions, promising to improve how consumers manage their finances, the companies said in a Monday (March 4) press release.  The partnership will leverage Hank Payments’ technology for payment and budget […]

Amazon said last week that its Innovation Fund is ramping up its investment in robotics. And as a report Monday (March 4) by Bloomberg News notes, the company already has robots working for it, with a humanoid device called Digit moving bins in one of its warehouses. The Bloomberg report focuses on Digit’s maker, a company called Agility Robotics, […]

American Express has launched a small business-focused integration with American Express Global Business Travel.  The collaboration, announced Monday (Mar. 4), lets businesses issue a virtual card for their employees via American Express Global Business Travel’s (Amex GBT) Neo1 spend management platform. This integration, the company said in a news release provided to PYMNTS, supports automated expense management […]

Behavioral fraud and social engineering scams are getting more dangerous for businesses. Despite the increasingly sophisticated weapons fraudsters have on hand to execute their scams, social engineering tactics remain one of their most effective ploys. This, as a study published Thursday (Feb. 29) by researchers at the University of Texas at Austin found that at least $75 […]

The European Commission has fined Apple 1.8 billion euros ($1.95 billion) for abusing its place in the music streaming market. The record fine, announced by the commission (EC) Monday (Mar. 4), is the European Union’s first antitrust levy against Apple and comes as the tech giant is dealing with competition issues on both sides of the Atlantic. Writing in a […]

Coupa has announced its latest launches around generative artificial intelligence (AI) and innovation. These new innovations join the company’s existing artificial intelligence (AI)-driven platform designed to help businesses operate smarter and grow faster by connecting and optimizing sourcing, purchasing, supply chains and financial management, Coupa said in a Monday (March 4) press release. “New AI […]

As consumers increasingly view their food habits not in disparate segments — grocery, restaurant, meal kit — but as one connected “eats” category, Wonder is seizing on the new dining opportunities this opens up. The omnichannel food hall company, founded and helmed by Jet.com Co-founder Marc Lore, recently opened a location in a Walmart. Wonder […]

Epic River has unveiled a specialized digital lending platform designed to bridge the gap between financial institutions and healthcare services. This solution aims to transform the way patient payments are managed, offering a new way to tackle the issue of unpaid medical bills within the healthcare sector, Epic River said in a Monday (March 4) […]

Galileo Financial Technologies has expanded its collaboration with The Bancorp to enable instant payments. Together, the companies use the RTP® network from The Clearing House to enable instant money movement between bank accounts, allowing FinTechs and brands to give their customers fast access to their funds, Galileo said in a Monday (March 4) press release. “Consumers and businesses expect payments to be available instantly, […]

China is reportedly taking measures to help its rising AI startups compete with tech giants. As the Financial Times (FT) reported Monday, at least 17 cities have committed to offering “computing vouchers” for startups to help them pay for increasing data center costs amid a shortage of the type of chips that are vital to the artificial […]

Last month, a top financial industry regulator voiced concerns that banking and FinTech collaborations might be “blurring the lines” between banking and commerce. According to Michael Hsu, CEO of the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC), such “blurring” can undermine public confidence in the financial services industry, just as it did in the […]

India wants tech companies to get government permission before launching untested artificial intelligence (AI) products. The country’s IT ministry has said tools that are “unreliable” or still being trialed must get the government’s go-ahead before release, Reuters reported Monday (March 4). As Reuters notes, the government’s actions came soon after a top minister criticized Google’s Gemini AI […]

The tidal wave of artificial intelligence (AI) that has hit the payments, commerce and financial services industries has created the need for a new definition. Because AI is enabling and accelerating momentum from analog and manual processes to automated, digital processes, AI and digital transformation belong in the same sentence. And one of the industries […]

Santander is reportedly cutting 320 jobs as it continues to embrace digital banking. The Spain-based bank has laid off a little under 3% of its American staff in the past few days, Bloomberg News reported Sunday (March 3), citing a source familiar with the matter. That person said the cuts are focused on Santander’s retail banking business. Reached […]

Dental services represent a $155 billion market that is projected to grow to $254 billion by 2032. Against that backdrop, it’s critical, especially in an inflationary environment, to include financing at the point of treatment to marry patient care with dental services and help ensure that practices collect on the monies owed. Dr. Steven Rasner, […]

Consumers are now saving less money for the proverbial rainy day than they were a year ago. The personal savings rate in January was 3.8%, which was higher than December’s 3.7% but still below the 4.8% consumers were socking away last summer. The trend may not ring immediate alarm bells, but it could prove problematic down the […]

The Connected Economy 100 Index notched a 1.9% gain as February gave way to March. And of the 10 pillars, only one — the Be Well segment — lost ground, off 0.2%.  United Healthcare shares gave up 7.1%.  A cyberattack on Change Healthcare, owned by United Healthcare, has reportedly affected a number of pharmacies. “Once […]

Businesses in the media and telecom space display strong appetites for a range of embedded finance innovations, from digital wallets to installment plans to business credit cards. Most payment facilitators (PayFacs), independent software vendors (ISVs) and marketplaces in this segment indicate robust demand for embedded loyalty and rewards program innovations and digital wallets. Despite serving […]

The digitization of financial services — and the rise of open banking — has given rise to a shifting landscape of partnerships. And the pursuit of innovation has led to a slew of bedfellows. Traditional banks and FinTech upstarts have joined together. The banks have the accounts, the decades worth of data, the regulatory structures […]

Digital insurance firm Lemonade says predictions of its demise have been greatly exaggerated. The company’s stock has fallen more than 70% since it went public in 2020, and saw its shares fall again last week.  But CEO and Co-Founder Daniel Schreiber told the Financial Times (FT) Sunday (March 3) that the company’s results, which showed a small […]