Sat.Dec 09, 2017 - Fri.Dec 15, 2017

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eBay Mulling Accepting Bitcoin As A Payment Method

PYMNTS

Online retailer eBay , following in the footsteps of Overstock.com, is contemplating allowing bitcoin as a payment method. In an interview with Yahoo Finance , Scott Cutler, SVP of eBay Americas, said the eCommerce retailer is “seriously considering” accepting bitcoin payments but noted the company is “not quite there yet.” He noted that eBay is currently focused on the holiday shopping season, which is turning out to be a strong one for online retailers. .

Retail 88
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Celebrating 75 Years by Giving Back to Our Communities

Katz,Sapper&Miller

When planning Katz, Sapper & Miller’s (KSM) 75th anniversary, we did not want to just celebrate a milestone. We wanted to show our appreciation for the communities where we do business. Investing in the places in which we live and work is at the core of KSM’s values, and so much of who we have become as a firm has been shaped by our communities.

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2017: The Year Of Digital Disruption For Payments

PYMNTS

A lot can happen in a year. What makes one stand out from another? How shall 2017 go down in the history books? Search Google for “2017: the year of…” and it becomes clear that many have seen this as a year of “death” and “disaster.” Others were not so quick to characterize it negatively, trawling the search engine instead for “the year of change.” Still others decided not to get philosophical about it at all, searching merely for “2017: the year of the rooster” or “the year of our Lord.”.

Gaming 81
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TRENDING: IBM On The New Rules Of The ‘API Economy’

PYMNTS

The emergence of APIs is doing more than just changing the way banks and FinTechs operate. It’s forcing them to create new marketplaces and ecosystems where innovations are traded and, in the process, upending the traditional rules of the financial services market. With the market rapidly evolving, is it time for traditional financial institutions (FIs) to learn the rules of the new API economy?

B2B 77
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Less Stress, More Success: Accounting Best Practices & Processes for 2025

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.

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How FIs Compete In The ‘API Economy’

PYMNTS

Banks and FinTechs may have had frosty relations in the past , but new open API ecosystems are now enabling former competitors to collaborate and grow their respective businesses. While collaboration is often seen as the more appealing approach, an open banking ecosystem invites its own challenges for traditional banks. Specifically, these financial institutions (FIs) must learn how to collaborate and innovate at a considerably faster pace.

B2B 69
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Hackers Behind Mirai Botnet Plead Guilty

PYMNTS

Three computer hackers behind the Mirai botnet, which kicked websites offline last year in cyberattacks, have pleaded guilty to cybercrime. Citing court documents, Reuters stated on Wednesday (Dec. 13) that former Rutgers University student Paras Jha pleaded guilty in federal court in New Jersey to charges, including writing code that enabled him to infect and control devices.

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The Mainstream Retail Future Of AR/VR

PYMNTS

Augmented and virtual worlds have long been touted as the future for all kinds of things — gaming, healthcare, travel, tele-learning. They’re experiences where being there counts in a lot of important ways, but virtualizing the experience and making it consumable digitally catches most of that in-person benefit, without the hassle of in-person travel.

Retail 63
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Person Present: The Future Of Card Not Present Identity Verification

PYMNTS

“Who are you?”. It’s a philosophical question with a million different answers depending on who’s asking. In payments, it is a practical question with just as many answers depending on the use case. Identity verification and user authentication are hot spaces right now, and only getting hotter as merchants, financial institutions (FIs) and consumers demand more foolproof protection against fraudsters.

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Standardizing Digital Payments Standardization

PYMNTS

The age-old question is: How do you create a standard that works for every digital payments innovator – and the consumers and businesses they serve – when the starting points for those innovations reflect their very different origins and digital strengths? It’s a question that’s very top of mind across the payments and commerce ecosystem, and particularly relevant in mobile and desktop commerce.

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The Power Of Bringing Better Data For The Holidays

PYMNTS

Arguably, the internet’s premier destination for auctions is eBay, which is not an unfair statement, given the sheer volume of said auctions going on via its website at any given moment. But as massive and instantly associable as auctions are, eBay has spent the last several years growing up, and growing past its old model. In fact, eBay is one of the web’s largest online marketplaces — with an estimated 168 million buyers in total — Customers eBay has spent much of 2017 trying to convince not t

Gaming 58
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Avoiding Lease Accounting Pitfalls in 2025: Lessons Learned from Spreadsheet Errors

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.

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Prime Growth Starting To Show Signs Of A Slowdown

PYMNTS

Amazon Prime may have had the best Prime Day ever this past summer, but Morgan Stanley warned there are signs that its Prime growth is starting to slow. According to news from CNBC , Morgan Stanley said in a research report this week that based on a survey of 1,000 adults in the U.S. during the third quarter, 40 percent of consumers in America already have Prime memberships, which matches the same level that was seen in the fourth quarter of last year.

Sales 54
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Mastercard’s Master Plan: Give Millennials What They Want

PYMNTS

“Avengers, assemble!” is a rally cry that would perk the ears of many millennials, but how about “ Mastercard , assemble?”. The card network is hoping that’s the case, as it rolls out the first use case stemming from its recently launched global prepaid money management platform. Assemble for millennials is a toolkit that issuers, corporations and IBCUs can use to enable digital financial solutions, in this case targeting millennials, using a single-access digital prepaid product.

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Wendy’s Joins The Dash For Delivery Market Share

PYMNTS

Forget presents under the tree. DoorDash is bringing Americans what they really want this holiday season: hot, fresh Wendy’s takeout delivered directly to their doors (or cold, fresh Frosties, if they so desire — DoorDash’s thermal bags can keep deliveries either hot or cold as needed). Wendy’s and DoorDash announced earlier this month that they were expanding their partnership following a successful pilot program at 135 restaurants across Columbus, Ohio, and Dallas, Texas.

Ohio 53
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Overstock CEO Says Its eCommerce Business Could Be Sold Within Three Months

PYMNTS

On Thursday (Dec. 14), Overstock.com CEO Patrick Byrne revealed that within the next three months the company should have a deal to sell or reorganize its retail business to focus on blockchain. In the interview with CNBC , Byrne said, “my goal is [within] 60 to 90 days we walk away from this,” noting he has an “ethical obligation” to focus on his new De Soto joint venture for the next five years.

Retail 51
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Back to Basics with Reconciliations

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.

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Startup Spotlight: GPShopper And The Overdue Evolution Of Luxury Retail

PYMNTS

Retail isn’t all about taking people’s money. Today, it’s also about telling a story and building an experience that makes customers want to shop with the brand again. So, one might think it would be a no-brainer for luxury brands, which have such a legacy presence in the market, to be all over the latest storytelling modes, with exciting new ways to draw consumers into their rich and storied history.

Retail 51
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A New Gift Card Hack For The Holidays

PYMNTS

There seems to be no such thing as a Christmas vacation when one’s main profession is defrauding consumers and businesses. It appears the ever-inventive thieves of the world have found a new way to make gift card fraud work for them this holiday season, according to the Better Business Bureau (BBB). This year the scam relies on thieves grabbing cards off the rack, scratching the film that covers the card PIN underneath and copying the relevant numbers.

Retail 51
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The Frightful Five: Fake Apps And Hubcaps

PYMNTS

When a company is as massive as any one of the Frightful Five, the bad news is it’s inevitable that some things will slip under the radar. Apple and Amazon learned that the hard way this week as partners called them out on fake apps and hubcaps for sale on their platforms. The good news, though, is that it’s never all bad news when you’re as big as the Frightful Five.

Finance 51
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Bringing ‘Try Before You Buy’ To Interior Design

PYMNTS

It looked great in the store, but it didn’t look so great when it got home. It’s a problem all consumers face, and it isn’t that big of a deal for most objects. Thinking better of a buy is an easily solved problem generally handled by finding a receipt and returning to the store to trade in a wrong purchase. But, as easy as that is when the item in question is, say, a t-shirt, the mechanics of buyer’s remorse become a good deal more complex when the thing that didn’

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Usage-Based Monetization Musts: A Roadmap for Sustainable Revenue Growth

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

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Shopping Malls Freshen Up With Chatbots

PYMNTS

Whether customers shop at a mall once a week or once a year, it’s safe to say that most would probably find a visit to the Mall of America a bit overwhelming, especially if they’ve brought the whole family along, and especially if it’s Christmas time. The mall is so big that the first challenge will be deciding where to park so that no one is walking across the entire property to reach the store they want to visit.

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Holiday Spending Continues Upward For Americans

PYMNTS

Thanks to early boosts from Black Friday and Cyber Monday sales, the holiday season is poised to be a merrier one for retailers, as Americans are upping their online and in-store spending, according to news from The Wall Street Journal on Thursday (Dec. 14). In fact, in-store, online and restaurant spend increased 0.8 percent in October, per reports from the Department of Commerce, beating economist estimates of 0.3 percent.

Retail 50
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Corporates Headed For GDPR Wakeup Call

PYMNTS

The eyes of the financial services world are on the EU’s upcoming PSD2 regulations, with many jurisdictions watching how the European market evolves and responds to regulations that support data sharing and open banking, while maintaining data security. But there’s another, less talked-about regulation coming in on the heels of PSD2, and it’s one that Jeff Nicholson, vice president of CRM product marketing at software company Pegasystems, says is a “sleeping giant.”

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TRENDING: How AmeriCommerce Powers Tailored Pricing

PYMNTS

Ambitious retailers don’t want to stay locked in one lane, but rather to spread to new audiences, new product types and more — and payments-powering companies are stepping up to give them the lift they need to reach these expansion dreams. The December edition of the PYMNTS Payments Powering Platforms Tracker , a WePay collaboration, features the latest insight from the CEO of AmeriCommerce, a major player in the eCommerce platform space, and the latest headlines from the space.

Gaming 49
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Harness the Potential of Your Enterprise Knowledge

The first Market Momentum Index: AI and Unstructured Data Management, conducted by Deep Analysis with support from AIIM and M-Files, surveyed 500 enterprises across various industries to assess their readiness to employ AI. The results reveal that AI is already far more embedded into organizations' operations than previously realized. These findings and more insights have been brought to you in the "Market Momentum Index: AI and Unstructured Data Management.

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Today In Data: VC For Cryptocurrencies, Bitcoin Records And Virtual ID Verification

PYMNTS

Today in PYMNTS’ data, venture capital (VC) funding is backing digital currency operations, bitcoin is edging up on record highs, identity (ID) verification solutions providers are helping merchants verify customers’ ideas, small- and medium-sized businesses (SMBs) are reporting they trust their payment providers and banking infrastructure and small community banks are enjoying the benefits of Same Day ACH credit transactions.

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Today In Data: Increased Shipping, Bitcoin Whirlwind And GDPR Non-Compliance

PYMNTS

Today in PYMNTS’ data, delivery firms will ship more packages than ever this holiday shopping season, bitcoin is having another whirlwind week, financial institutions (FIs) are working toward better innovations to create higher customer satisfaction, B2B digital procurement tools are not being used to their fullest potentials and the upcoming General Data Protection Regulations (GDPR) might leave some businesses non-compliant.

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B2B Payments Remains Without A Clear Picture Of Faster Payments’ Impact

PYMNTS

Faster and real-time payments are generally considered a benefit for the consumer payments world. But with the U.S. finally making inroads in its faster payments initiatives, it’s now time to see whether faster payments will make their way into the B2B sphere too. Released last week, December’s PYMNTS Faster Payments Tracker , powered by NACHA , tracks progress of faster payments initiatives throughout the U.S.

B2B 48
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Invoicing, Internationally, On The Fly And With Flywire

PYMNTS

Life is full of complexity. Life for a small- to mid-sized business (SMB) scaling operations into new countries? Complex on so many levels, especially when it comes to payments and, more specifically, invoicing, where demands for payment are tracked through paper and electronic means. On a good day, managing the ebb and flow of supply chains, accounts receivable and accounts payable can be challenging; on a bad day, juggling all those spinning plates becomes a nightmare.

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Solve Your Firm's Automation Complexities Once and For All

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.

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Alibaba’s Plans For A Giant Car Vending Machine

PYMNTS

After announcing a deal to help Ford sell electric vehicles in China, Alibaba has unveiled how they plan to sell them: Car Vending Machines that look like futuristic buildings. According to Tech Crunch , customers simply use Alibaba’s Taobao app to scan a car that they want to test drive. Once the system recognizes the vehicle, it allows users to pick a color, and once they enter basic information and snap a selfie, arrange for a test-drive if the vehicle is available.

Retail 47
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Bitcoin Reaches ‘Mania’ Phase As People Take Out Loans To Fund Token Purchases

PYMNTS

Joseph Borg, president of the North American Securities Administrators Association warned on Tuesday (Dec. 12) that bitcoin has entered the “mania” phase, with some people taking out mortgages just to purchase the cryptocurrency. In an interview with CNBC , Borg said that bitcoin shares are on the “mania curve” and that there has to be a leveling off at some point.

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Walmart’s Early Pay Sizzles While Munchee’s ICO Bites The Dust

PYMNTS

In this space we have highlighted the need to “Kill the Check” through a number of interviews with Ingo Money CEO Drew Edwards. And driving a nail into the paper coffin has some real benefits — the most obvious one would be the literal abandonment of paper, where processing costs are as high as $10 a check. That’s money out the door for companies just to send money out the door.

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Japanese Internet Giant To Offer Bitcoin For Payroll

PYMNTS

A Japanese internet service provider (ISP) is reportedly readying to pay employees in bitcoin. According to news from Bitcoin Magazine on Thursday (Dec. 14), GMO Internet Group, which provides internet services for consumers and businesses, is introducing an option for employees to receive part of their salary in bitcoin. The publication noted that while cyrptocurrency companies have been using bitcoin for payroll for some time, the move by GMO Internet Group suggests mainstream, traditional co

payroll 46
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It Takes Two to Tango

With automation, you’ll reduce errors and save valuable time, allowing you to focus on what really matters: strategic analysis and insightful decision-making. Picture accurate financial reports ready at your fingertips, giving you the confidence to tackle business challenges head-on. Embracing automation not only boosts productivity but also elevates your role from number cruncher to closing rockstar.