PYMNTS

MARCH 24, 2016

We’ve known that subscription box sites were on the rise, but new data showing the particular numbers in that regard is nonetheless impressive. EMarketer reports that, according to a recent study from Hitwise, visits to subscription box sites (online subscription retail services like BarkBox , Birchbox and Dollar Shave Club , which, on a monthly basis, provide their members with goods delivered quite literally in a box) in the United States have increased by nearly 3,000 percent in the pas

eCommerce 65

eCommerce Retail Numbers 65

PYMNTS

MARCH 17, 2016

Cumulus Funding, a consumer finance company specializing in providing Income Share Agreements (“ISAs”) to individuals seeking a more flexible consumer finance alternative, has announced a major funding round today (March 17). Cumulus announced it has closed a round of financing of over $30 million in capital, including $6 million in equity funding and a committed $25 million debt financing facility.

Finance 59

Finance Investments Banking Technology 59

PYMNTS

MARCH 2, 2016

We’ve said it before and we will say it again — when it comes to mobile payments, there’s no one-size-fits-all solution, any more than there is one-size-fits-all payment method. But what is clear is that the mobile solution that will ultimately garner the critical mass needed to ignite it will solve a problem for a consumer. Paying in a store hasn’t ever really been much of a problem – until EMV, anyway — so convincing consumers that it was better for them to pull out their phone and tap at some

Leverage 57

Leverage Technology Sales Numbers 57

PYMNTS

MARCH 14, 2016

The blockchain has been considered a possible means to overhaul an array of aspects in B2B payments, including cross-border and smart documentation. One company wants to use the technology for supply chain management, including payments and invoicing, and, late last week, rolled out its solution to do so. Fluent said Friday (March 11) that it is debuting the Fluent Network, a blockchain-based software platform for cross-border B2B trade aimed at the businesses and financial institutions that pla

Accounts Payable 56

Accounts Payable B2B Invoicing Startups 56

Speaker: Michael Veatch, Senior Director, Implementations & Ella Aguirre, Director of Solution Consulting

Embedding payments can be a transformative step for software companies looking to enhance their platform capabilities, boost customer satisfaction, and drive long-term growth. However, the success of payments hinges on a single thing: implementation. Drawing on real-world insights and experiences, payments implementation experts Michael Veatch and Ella Aguirre will explore actionable strategies that can lead to a transparent, friction-free launch and mitigate potential challenges like technical

Investments

PYMNTS

MARCH 26, 2016

A loan company employee has pleaded guilty to stealing identities of several customers and fraudulently seeking $400,000 in tax returns. According to court documents , Montgomery, Alabama resident Wendy Huff, who worked at two different insurance companies between January 2013 and August 2015, stole personal information of her employers’ customers, including their names, social security numbers and dates of birth.

Treasury 56

Treasury Securities Numbers 56

PYMNTS

MARCH 8, 2016

It seems like every innovative, disruptive service changing the world today was immediately met with skepticism upon release. When Uber came out, taxis and regulators claimed that nobody would want to get into a random driver’s car. When Airbnb launched, hotels laughed at the premise that travelers would give up on their traditionally luxurious experiences.

Investments 55

Investments Marketing Numbers Planning 55

PYMNTS

MARCH 21, 2016

By any stretch, President Barack Obama’s trip to Cuba is a historic event. After all, he is the first United States president to visit the tiny nation, so long a U.S. adversary, in roughly 90 years. Obama has reopened the U.S. embassy there and has also paved the path for commercial airline flights to begin to that nation. Mail will go back and forth between the two countries.

Banking 52

Banking Marketing 52

PYMNTS

MARCH 31, 2016

If Beyoncé and Jay Z ever see their musical careers go in the tank (they won’t), at least now they have their own music streaming service to fall back on for day jobs. On the other hand, Solange — Beyoncé’s sister — has to make her eCommerce venture work without the luxury of a few Billboard charting tunes. That’s the mission behind the relaunch of Solange’s online store for her Saint Heron fashion line, which aims to incorporate diversity into every design it sells.

eCommerce 52

eCommerce Retail Marketing 52

PYMNTS

MARCH 14, 2016

Payment fraud evolves in ways that are truly frightening — and with haste. Fraudsters are continually scrambling to keep up with, and have one foot in front of, technology, with recent stumbling blocks in the form of EMV, in the United States, likely to give rise to greater card-not-present fraud. But the would-be payments criminals have potent weaponry at hand, including ever faster, ever more powerful and ever cheaper computing power, and they have been targeting, according to data science fir

Technology 51

Technology Marketing Securities 51

Speaker: Amanda Adams, Fractional CFO, CPA

Are you ready to elevate your accounting processes for 2025? 🚀 Join us for an exclusive webinar led by Amanda Adams, a seasoned fractional CFO and CPA passionate about transforming back-office operations for finance teams. This session will cover critical best practices and process improvements tailored specifically for accounting professionals.

Accounting

PYMNTS

MARCH 23, 2016

The whispers have grown to loud chatter when it comes to blockchain technology and the impact it might have on the financial services sector. What once may not have been taken seriously — cryptocurrencies and futuristic payments — is today exploding as the innovation financial institutions are targeting for investments, largely hoping to get a jump on the blockchain before disruption takes a bite out of their traditional business.

Startups 50

Startups Banking Compliance Leverage 50

PYMNTS

MARCH 28, 2016

The path to faster payments in the U.S. doesn’t have to be paved with a 500+ person task force analyzing what the world would look like if we were starting from a clean sheet of paper, competing propositions for who’s going to build and operate a new set of rails, or even what sort of spiffy software can make existing rails faster. Instead, we could do something right away — or almost right away — that would make payments between consumers and businesses faster.

Accounting 48

Accounting Banking Financial Systems Retail 48

PYMNTS

MARCH 7, 2016

While some Asian country economies may be slowing down, the health of the online retail markets across the continent is booming. According to a recent report from Forrester, as reported on by ZDNet , total eCommerce revenue for China, Japan, South Korea, India and Australia is projected to nearly double in the next five years, from $733 billion in 2014 to $1.4 trillion by 2020.

eCommerce 48

eCommerce Marketing Retail Economics 48

PYMNTS

MARCH 30, 2016

Cybersecurity firm FireEye warns of the dangers that custom-built malware poses to retailers due to its ability to capture payment card details directly from retail point-of-sale (POS) systems. In an article posted to its research blog on Monday (March 28), FireEye warned about the POS malware called TREASUREHUNT that it said is designed to enumerate running processes, extract payment card data from memory and then transmit the stolen information to a command and control server.

Communication 47

Communication Retail Sales Technology 47

Speaker: Abdi Ali, Sr. Lease Accounting Consultant

Join this insightful webinar with industry expert Abdi Ali, who will discuss the challenges that can arise from managing lease accounting with spreadsheets! He will share real-world examples of errors, compliance issues, and risks that may be present within your spreadsheets. Learn how these tools, while useful, can sometimes lead to inefficiencies that affect your time, resources, and peace of mind.

Accounting

PYMNTS

MARCH 2, 2016

Blockchain proponents say the disruptive technology is worth the onboarding process. Among one of the loudest of these blockchain champions is Ripple, a FinTech firm that has recently secured millions of dollars in investments and strategic partnerships aimed at promoting blockchain technology’s use for traditionally friction-rich areas, like cross-border payments and real-time payments.

Currencies 46

Currencies Treasury Foreign Exchange Compliance 46

PYMNTS

MARCH 11, 2016

The feud between Apple and the FBI has turned hostile, with the government agency calling out Apple’s actions as false and corrosive to the very system meant to protect rights. “Here, Apple deliberately raised technological barriers that now stand between a lawful warrant and an iPhone containing evidence related to the terrorist mass murder of 14 Americans.

Technology 46

Technology Marketing Securities 46

PYMNTS

MARCH 23, 2016

Let’s go back for a minute to the year 1999. It was just about a decade years after Tim Berners-Lee gave people the ability to actually use the Internet via World Wide Web. 171 million of the 6 billion humans on the planet were using the Internet. And 51 percent of CEOs said that the Internet probably wouldn’t have a big impact on their business.

Technology 45

Technology Communication Retail Securities 45

PYMNTS

MARCH 29, 2016

As the FBI works to combat a specific type of ransomware virus, it is calling on businesses and software security experts for emergency assistance in its investigation. Over the weekend, Reuters obtained a confidential “Flash” advisory from the FBI: “We need your help!” The particular strain of ransomware the FBI is fighting is known as MSIL/Samas.A and is being used by hackers for extortion.

Securities 45

Securities 45

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Join us in this webinar, where we share best practices on how to think about the reconciliation work each month, when best to do reconciliations, how they should be prepared, and some common pitfalls to avoid. Learning Objectives: This course objective is to understand how to properly prepare and review balance sheet reconciliations and its impact on the financial statements.

Reconciliations

PYMNTS

MARCH 25, 2016

An inherent truth of the retail industry — that consumers, at the end of the day, wield the ultimate power in determining what products and companies succeed — can even be applied to entire business models. Pet retail is, by and large, in no danger of slowing down any time soon, given that consumers’ affection for cuddly companions (and not-so-objectively-cuddly ones, like fish and reptiles) translated into a $17.5 billion business worldwide as of last year.

Retail 45

Retail Profit and Loss Sales Education 45

PYMNTS

MARCH 21, 2016

Small and medium businesses (SMBs) are the backbone of the American economy. They account for almost half of payroll (48%) and have created about 60% of new jobs since 2009. Given the rapid growth of technology solutions that can help these businesses thrive, not to mention get an edge with their customers, PYMNTS.com and Sage set out to measure the rate of adoption of these technologies for SMBs across the U.S.

Technology 45

Technology B2C Invoicing Education 45

PYMNTS

MARCH 16, 2016

Every generation has to eat, but every generation doesn’t have to eat the same way. Whole Foods and other retailers capitalizing on the at-home health food craze were able to get out in front of millennial eating trends — or, at least, start riding at the crest of the wave. Fast casual restaurants weren’t so prescient, though, and now, cracks are appearing in one of the Baby Boomer generation’s most enduring retail trends.

Retail 45

Retail Planning Marketing 45

PYMNTS

MARCH 23, 2016

Cars that can find cheap gas, a table for 2 at a restaurant nearby and advance order milk, cereal and paper towels for a quick pick up on the way home are no longer a wild and crazy idea never to see the light of day. Software and applications are eating commerce. Well, to be precise, enabling it in ways that are limited only by the imaginations of the innovators who see ways to tuck commerce into the places where consumers and businesses meet to do business.

Entertainment 45

Entertainment Retail Technology Securities 45

Speaker: David Warren and Kevin O’Neill Stoll

Transitioning to a usage-based business model offers powerful growth opportunities but comes with unique challenges. How do you validate strategies, reduce risks, and ensure alignment with customer value? Join us for a deep dive into designing effective pilots that test the waters and drive success in usage-based revenue. Discover how to develop a pilot that captures real customer feedback, aligns internal teams with usage metrics, and rethinks sales incentives to prioritize lasting customer eng

Sales

PYMNTS

MARCH 28, 2016

“There exists a bizarre gap in today’s state of financial services.” That’s the philosophy of Shake, a new startup in the bitcoin world that is (unsurprisingly) trying to pitch a payment method that doesn’t involve banks, governments or regulators. Instead, its latest product rollout is all about making bitcoin and digital currency payments easier to make.

Startups 45

Startups Currencies Securities Numbers 45

PYMNTS

MARCH 30, 2016

First, video killed the radio star. Then, CDs, MP3s and the iPod caused the death of their predecessors. From the 1990s to the mid-2000s, it seemed like the future of music was directly headed for increasingly smaller players in increasingly intangible formats. But just when the last iPods started giving way to entirely online streaming services, millennial audiophiles suddenly fell back in love with vinyl records — a music format they never even knew growing up.

Advertising 44

Advertising Retail Communication Marketing 44

PYMNTS

MARCH 24, 2016

Starbucks isn’t quite done tinkering with its rewards program. Following the news last month that the coffee giant will, beginning in April, revamp its loyalty program so that it rewards customers with “stars” (AKA points) based on dollar amount spent rather than per transaction (a change that was met with a mixed response from consumers), The New York Times reports that Starbucks is also going to offer a prepaid card that will provide customers with another way to earn stars.

Retail 0

Retail Accounting 0

PYMNTS

MARCH 31, 2016

A decade ago, Etsy was the only way that some small-scale crafts makers and artisans could participate in the eCommerce world. Now, however, the pop-up shop is quickly enshrining itself as the preferred way for emerging brands to bring their wares quickly and efficiently to market. The New York Times has the story of how several brands with small-to-nonexistent physical footprints are using the phenomenon of the pop-up shop to make big waves in areas only traditional retail proved able to until

Retail 44

Retail eCommerce Sales Marketing 44

Speaker: Mark Stovel

When it comes to automating, many firms focus on finding the latest tech, believing that efficiency is something achieved through new tools. Yet true efficiency is achieved by delivering real value to clients, not merely by upgraded systems. Without a clear approach, no level of automation can overcome the complexities of serving every client’s needs.

Marketing