June 2024: Top five payments stories of the month
June has seen a number of new payments innovations, ranging from new product launches to partnerships. Here, we run through five of the top payment stories of the month, featuring Apple, Visa, Mastercard, Sticpay and more.
Mastercard commits to phasing out manual card entry in e-commerce by 2030
Mastercard seeks to tokenise e-commerce
Mastercard has affirmed its “global commitment” to phasing out the requirement for manual card entry during online purchases as part of its renewed effort to make e-commerce “safer and more accessible for everyone”.
The announcement this month appears to recognise the growing proliferation of contactless payments across in-person payment experiences, and thus the opportunity to “bring that same experience to online checkout”.
To achieve this, the payment network claims to currently be leveraging “tokenisation, streamlined guest checkout and payment passkeys”, with the overarching aim of facilitating “a consistent experience across devices, browsers, and operating systems” and phasing out manual card entry for e-commerce in Europe by 2030.
Lloyds Banking Group expands card and payments partnership with Visa in the UK
Lloyds Banking Group expanded its long-standing partnership with Visa this month by naming the payment network as its leading scheme provider for its Lloyds Bank, Halifax, Bank of Scotland and MBNA brands in the UK.
Through the partnership, the two firms plan to supply the brands with new products and services with a specific focus on serving customers’ “financial and lifestyle needs” and “enabling even greater use of Visa’s fraud prevention capabilities”, according to a statement.
Lloyds says Visa, which it has been in partnership with for the last 40 years, “will continue to provide all Lloyds Banking Group’s consumer and business debit cards, including over 30 million Visa credentials already in issue, as well as the majority of consumer and commercial credit cards”, with plans to migrate around 10 million more cards to Visa by the end of 2026.
JP Morgan Payments head Takis Georgakopoulos to step down after 17 years at the bank
Takis Georgakopoulos steps down from JP Morgan Payments (Image: LinkedIn)
Takis Georgakopoulos announced this month that he is stepping down from his role as global head of JP Morgan Payments, a position he has held for the last seven years, stating he has “decided to pursue a very exciting opportunity outside the firm (to be announced in due course)”.
Reflecting on the outgoing executive’s tenure, Jennifer Piepszak and Troy Rohrbaugh, co-heads of JP Morgan’s Commercial and Investment Bank (CIB), noted in the memo that Georgakopoulos has played a key role in helping JP Morgan Payments “become one of the firm’s biggest growth engines, increasing revenue and market share in a highly competitive environment”.
In response to Georgakopoulos relinquishing his position, Umar Farooq and Max Neukirchen have been appointed as co-heads of global payments, effective immediately.
E-wallet provider Sticpay bolsters money transfer capabilities with UPI integration in India
UK-based e-wallet service provider and payment gateway Sticpay has integrated Unified Payments Interface (UPI), India’s mobile-based fast payment system, into its solution.
The integration this month will enable UPI users in India to manage payments through Sticpay’s platform and “make domestic and international money transfers more quickly, affordably and securely”, without the need for traditional banking infrastructure.
Furthermore, the paytech also promotes the move as a benefit to local businesses in the form of “an additional digital payment option at a time when more than 40% of payments in India have become digital”.
Apple to discontinue pay later service in the US
Apple cancels Pay Later service in US
Apple is winding down its buy now, pay later (BNPL) service in favour of a new instalment loan offering set to arrive “later this year”.
The announcement comes just 15 months after the tech giant first debuted Apple Pay Later in the US, which enables users to borrow between $50 and $1,000 and pay back the loan over four instalments spread over six weeks. Apple then delivered a general launch of the service the following October.
However, the company now appears to be pivoting its interests in consumer lending towards an instalment loan offering, with plans to action its arrival through a string of global partnerships.
This includes partnerships with ANZ in Australia, CaixaBank in Spain, HSBC and Monzo in the UK, and Citi, Synchrony, Affirm and Fiserv issuers in the US.
