A consortium of merchant groups has been given more time to decide if it will try to take a long-running lawsuit against the Federal Reserve Board of Governors to the U.S. Supreme Court.
While digital currency has received a frosty reception from many national governments, it has been greeted a bit more warmly in Canada.
CFPB Director Richard Cordray headed to the House yesterday to present his bureau’s semi-annual report to the House Financial Services Committee, headed by Jeb Hensarling (R-Texas).
The FDIC has issued another consent order for a company with significant prepaid business and again the focus is on Bank Secrecy Act (BSA) compliance.
In April, US post-trade utility the DTCC called for the US settlement cycle to be moved to T+2, to bring it into line with what’s happening in the rest of the world, which is converging on T+2 settlement cycles – at different speeds.
Despite promises of change heralded by the European Commission’s upcoming MiFID II, the cost of market data in Europe is still far too high and transparency remains a serious problem, according to senior financial industry executives. Yet the arrival of the Market Model Typology standard earlier this year may provide a catalyst for change.
A new generation of trading venues is competing their way into the European securities markets with plans to make trading more efficient. But will they bring benefit to banks and investors?
The Bancorp Bank, a wholly owned subsidiary of The Bancorp Inc., this week revealed in an 8K filing with the SEC that it’s stepping up its Bank Secrecy Act (BSA) compliance efforts in accordance with an FDIC consent order that went into effect June 5.
As the European Parliament adopted MiFID II/MiFIR on 15 April, the financial services industry was left wondering what exactly the new transparency regime is going to mean. Despite a curiously low EC estimate of compliance costs, at between €512 and €732 million, it is clear that MiFID II will have a large impact on the tens of thousands of firms and counterparties that will now fall under its scope.
The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) has bumped plans to release its proposed rule on prepaid cards to “the end of the summer,” according to Richard Cordray, the agency’s director.
Banking Technology first appeared 30 years ago this month. David Bannister, the current editor, looks back at that first year of coverage …
Shifting settlement cycles, the rise of big data, global regulation and increasing demand for post-trade services are creating both challenges and opportunities that global exchanges would do well to face wisely, according to Lars Ottersgard, head of market technology and Eva Saidac, head of business development market technology at Nasdaq OMX.
We have the opportunity to make a difference, to be part of the process and to influence the outcome of prepaid regulations.
Across the financial services sector, the question is now less about where cloud technology is being used, and more about where it isn’t used. Where do financial institutions draw the line when it comes to deciding whether to keep a process or IT-related service in-house or outsource it to specialists such as Amazon Web Services, SAP and many others?
If proposed changes to simplified due diligence go through as drafted, it will drive out a whole section of the prepaid market from Europe.
Looked at from a data perspective, many new regulations have overlapping requirements that come back to customer data. Banking Technology joined forces with Markit І Genpact KYC Services and regulatory specialist JWG to look at how firms are approaching the challenges this poses.
GPR and payroll providers may be eager to take advantage of what the CFPB estimates will be $17 million in annual saving across the financial services industry. The proposed rule, however, may not be a real option for prepaid providers.
The central bank has pulled back on a mandate requiring new POS and ATM terminals to include biometric authentication. However, it’s also enabling prepaid providers, for the first time, to offer cashout at biometric terminals.
While the logjam over EMV debit routing may finally be breaking up, it remains unlikely that EMV will reach the mainstream ahead of the liability shifts the payment networks plan to implement in October 2015.
Suggesting that investments in digital currencies, such as Bitcoin, might carry with them a higher risk of fraud and a harder time recovering losses in the event of fraud or theft, the SEC yesterday issued an investor alert regarding the decentralized P2P currency.
Although this lawsuit involves lending practices, the industry would be wise to pay close attention because of its UDAAP implications, which are applicable to all entities the CFPB regulates.
Rules issued last December by Canada’s Department of Finance affecting open- and closed-loop prepaid cards went into effect May 1.
The State of Delaware has thrown its weight behind a civil lawsuit claiming nearly two dozen well-known retailers avoided escheating unused gift card balances to the state by forming special entity corporations based outside the state.
FTC calls for data security legislation to address recent increase of data security breaches.
A new Canadian bill proposes regulations on virtual currencies, cross-border MSBs, due diligence requirements, politically exposed persons and group-wide information sharing.
Bitcoin is the poster child of the cryptocurrency world, but it’s not alone. Michael Mainelli and Bob McDowell take a look at the real-world implications of the rise of AltCoins
When the requirement brought about by the German high frequency trading act to tag algorithms comes into force this month, market participants may well feel hamstrung by the complexity of the regime – and some might wonder whether this requirement goes one step too far …
When the US Federal Reserve Banks asked for comments on improving the US payments system, the tech industry and merchants said “let’s go” while the incumbents said “whoa, not so fast” …
European Parliament today voted in a plenary session to accept the text of the revised payment industry regulations (PSD2 and MIF) that the ECON committee voted on last month.
Building on previous consultations by Her Majesty’s Treasury and the Office of Fair Trading, the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) is soliciting comment regarding the U.K. payments industry, in particular on issues of competition, access, governance, ownership and innovation.
With a revolution in consumer payments happening at the point-of-sale, online and increasingly through the mobile channel, there is a need and an appetite for change across every aspect of the payments industry.
What do apples and oranges have to do with prepaid model disclosures? See David Beam’s analysis of the CFPB’s blog proposal.
Had the case not been dismissed, ZIP code-related class action lawsuits likely would spread.
While transparency may be seen as a new wonder drug that will cure all the industry’s ills, it does not come without side effects, so it was refreshing to see ESMA promoting a collaborative approach with the industry in defining the details of how MiFID II and MiFIR are implemented.
Heading to college is all about the quest for knowledge. Part of that process is learning to use fact-based, impartial research to reach educated conclusions. Unfortunately, the March 10 Department of Education’s Inspector General’s report, “Third-Party Servicer Use of Debit Cards to Deliver Title IV Funds,” doesn’t make the grade.
Fixed income is a bit like the tortoise of Aesop’s fables, while equities is unquestionably the rambunctious hare. While equities finished the race towards an agency trading model many years ago, fixed income is just plodding onto the starting lines now. But a little outsourcing may provide the rocket boost the industry needs to push ahead, according to Carl James, managing director of dealing services UK at BNP Paribas.
Legislators and companies, such as MasterCard, are introducing standards for prepaid card disclosures that help us all.
Mobile payment isn’t about reinventing the wheel – it’s about making merchants and customers’ lives better by establishing a relationship built on knowledge and trust, according to mobile payments platform Znap.
Until the world has a definitive Legal Entity Identifier, we are going to have to recognise that piecemeal adoption brings with it significant hidden costs in validating, enriching and mapping for regulatory purposes. If the total number of registered market participants is meant to include all the corporates that trade FX forwards, we are far short.
After many years of struggle, Mexicans may be about to snatch the crown of Latin America’s most promising financial services market from their Portuguese-speaking cousins in Brazil.
