Affirm partnerships target growth

The company’s latest collaborations are aimed at branching out into more sectors of the economy, consultants and analysts say.

By Patrick Cooley • Feb. 17, 2026

Cash App debuts payment links

After PayPal debuted a similar feature last year, Cash App also wants to simplify payment requests for users.

By Tatiana Walk-Morris • Feb. 12, 2026

Explore the Trendline➔

Digital wallets proliferate as features advance

As more companies aim to offer digital wallets the rise in competition is sharpening their features.  

By Payments Dive staff

Judge backs Illinois law on card fees

A U.S. judge ruled that federal bank law doesn’t preempt an Illinois effort to ban card interchange fees on sales tax and tips. Bank groups vowed to appeal.

By Justin Bachman • Feb. 11, 2026

Fiserv struggles with financial business

Revenue in the company’s financial services and banking sectors fell year-over-year, which executives attributed to market share loss among credit unions.

By Patrick Cooley • Feb. 10, 2026

Zip debuts pay-in-2 option

The buy now, pay later company on Wednesday started letting U.S. customers split everyday payments in half, rather than into four installments.

By Patrick Cooley • Feb. 6, 2026

Arizona mulls card rate cap

A state senator has introduced a bill that follows President Donald Trump’s lead in seeking to cap credit card interest rates.

By Lynne Marek • Feb. 5, 2026

Visa, Amex vie for small businesses

The card networks are each pitching new services to mom-and-pop stores, including financing options as well as tools for expense management and fraud mitigation.

By Patrick Cooley • Feb. 5, 2026

Spire names new CEO to grow pay-by-bank

The company hired former Fiserv executive Jennifer LaClair and raised $10 million to expand services enabling consumers to make direct payments from their bank accounts to merchants.

By Justin Bachman • Feb. 5, 2026

Mastercard offers agentic AI tools

The payments giant plans to provide agentic AI capabilities to merchants using its services by the end of June.

By Tatiana Walk-Morris • Feb. 4, 2026

What went wrong at PayPal

Slow merchant adoption of the digital payment pioneer’s latest technology and lagging growth of its legacy checkout services stymied growth plans.

By Lynne Marek • Feb. 4, 2026

How AI commerce threatens eBay, Amazon

Agentic robots that shop and pay without human involvement could potentially render retail marketplaces obsolete – and big merchants are responding.

By Justin Bachman • Feb. 4, 2026

PayPal appoints new CEO

The digital payments company tapped former HP CEO Enrique Lores as its new chief executive Tuesday, casting aside Alex Chriss.

By Lynne Marek • Feb. 3, 2026

Amex buoyed by big spenders

The card network reported a 15% year-over-year increase in cardholder spending at luxury merchants.

By Patrick Cooley • Feb. 2, 2026

Charting 2026 payments trends

Here are 4 stories that round up our deep dive outlook for this year, including coverage of agentic payments, fraud and personalization.

By Lynne Marek • Jan. 30, 2026

Visa doles out stablecoin advice

The company began offering clients strategic counsel on the digital assets last month, but doesn’t foresee many U.S. consumer use cases.

By Lynne Marek • Jan. 30, 2026

Mastercard reworks Cap One pact

The card network's CEO said the company signed a new agreement with Capital One, reaffirming ties despite the bank’s purchase of rival Discover.

By Lynne Marek • Jan. 29, 2026

Fiserv sued over alleged lax security

A Tampa credit union alleged that the processor failed to protect customers from cyber hacks, but charged extra fees for a security upgrade.

By Patrick Cooley • Jan. 29, 2026

Bot payments lag in agentic commerce

Within the emerging world of agentic commerce, a broad gap exists between bot shopping and autonomous payments.

By Justin Bachman • Jan. 29, 2026

Amazon to halt palm payments

The online retailer said all Amazon One palm readers will be removed from physical stores by June 3.

By Patrick Cooley • Jan. 28, 2026

Secret Service foils card skimmers

The federal agency last year identified and deactivated some 400 illegal card reader inserts in major U.S. cities.

By Lynne Marek • Jan. 26, 2026

How payment personalization could change the way we pay

The emerging trend will require payment companies to jockey for position in payment suggestions offered by agentic shopping tools.

By Patrick Cooley • Jan. 26, 2026

Affirm seeks Nevada bank charter

The company said Friday that it submitted applications to state and federal regulators to start Affirm Bank.

By Patrick Cooley • Jan. 23, 2026

Verifone tackles identity challenge

The company seeks to bring the benefits of digital shopping, particularly in consumer identification, to the in-person retail world.

By Lynne Marek • Jan. 23, 2026

PayPal buys Israeli AI firm

The digital payments pioneer said it purchased Cymbio, a company that has been a partner in providing multi-channel orchestration services.

By Lynne Marek • Jan. 22, 2026

Why Shift4 targets big merchants

The processor’s CEO explained why the payment processor looks for merchant customers with multiple locations or vendors with complex software needs.

By Patrick Cooley • Jan. 22, 2026