Pay later provider Sezzle says it has added improved shopping features to its platform. Amin Sabzivand, the firm’s chief operating officer, said, “By introducing these new features, we’re helping consumers effortlessly find the best deals and maximize their savings — wherever they shop.” Among the new offerings is Sezzle On-Demand, created in response to what the company says was a strong demand for a non-subscription version of its subscription product. This new product lets shoppers create a single-use virtual card for a set amount, allowing them to split payments “without being limited to partnered merchants,” Sezzle said. In addition, Sezzle has added features to its product marketplace that included personalized recommendations and instant price drop alerts. The company has also introduced an “auto couponing feature.” Shoppers can now access exclusive deals directly through the Sezzle app, with available coupons automatically applied at checkout — no extra steps required
NY Fed’s data shows that 86% of interchange fees is passed on as rewards; banks’ average interchange income is 1.82% of purchase volume on average, while rewards costs are 1.57%.
Research this week from the New York Fed underscores the economics of interchange fees, putting a number on the scale and scope of the rewards programs and how they are paid for, and that at a high level keep the four-party card ecosystem running. The ecosystem’s been around for decades, the funding mechanism’s not new, but the figures show just how the rewards expenses — for the six largest card issuers at about $67.9 billion — are covered. The Fed’s data delves into the extend to which the rewards expenses are covered by the banks’ interchange income. The Fed found that banks’ average interchange income is 1.82% of purchase volume on average, while rewards costs are 1.57%. The majority of the income, then — at about 86% — is passed on to cardholders in the form of rewards. Banks and payment networks are in the ever-constant midst of upgrading and improving their fraud defense systems, and the more cardholders use their cards, the more the rewards programs and the defenses must be expanded. The economics of interchange, whether credit or debit, remains a timely topic. The U.K.’s in the midst of a battle over debit interchange that would cap those fees. In the U.S., the Credit Card Competition Act, reintroduced in the last Congress, may surface yet again, would seek to drive interchange fees lower as merchants choose the networks over which they would route card transactions. But as it stands now, in the four-party model that’s been in place for decades (the consumer, the merchant acquirer, the card issuing bank and the merchant) the interchange fees are paid by merchant acquirers to the card issuer. Interchange fees are a percentage of a product’s purchase price (around 2% usually, per the Fed’s analysis) that is charged to the seller and paid out to the banks. As Karen Webster noted in this column, the network “isn’t touching the interchange fee, which goes right to the issuer. And … the interchange fee isn’t a cost to the consumer. The issuers get the fees and generally pass them along to consumers in the form of rewards and other benefits.”
ICE Mortgage Technology automates borrower asset assessment using AI driven data analysis and configurable logic to identify large deposits and withdrawal patterns
ICE Mortgage Technology has announced the debut of ICE Asset Analyzer and ICE Audit Analyzer, adding to the existing ICE Income and ICE Credit analyzers. The products, which are fully integrated into the Encompass system, allow mortgage professionals to quickly and accurately streamline lending processes, improve accuracy and support compliance efforts. Asset Analyzer uses data analysis and configurable logic to “simplify the traditionally manual process of assessing borrower assets,” ICE said. It added that its key tasks include identifying large deposits, recognizing withdrawal patterns and applying a standardized checklist to ensure consistency across loans. The tools allow lenders to free up employees to execute higher-value work, ICE said. ICE’s Audit Analyzer is designed to improve post-closing quality control. Instead of relying on manual checklists, the tool uses automated technology to help identify missing documents, data discrepancies and compliance risks to ensure document accuracy, improve regulatory adherence and limit repurchase risk. Tim Bowler, president of ICE Mortgage Technology, said “By integrating these Analyzers within Encompass, we’re enabling our customers to perform more of their essential work within a single platform, making their lives easier, and saving them time and money they’d otherwise have to spend performing these functions offline.”
Afterpay launches its own commerce media network based on signals and audience data from 350M transactions, to help brands reach young shoppers
Afterpay’s move into advertising is leveraging its younger user base. Saket Mehta, Afterpay’s VP of global advertising, partnerships and revenue, said Gen Z and millennials are using Afterpay to engage with brands and manage their spending. “So leveraging commerce media, the signals that we have, the audiences that are coming, and really shaping the way that the next generation is going to pay and work with financial companies is critical,” Mehta told. Afterpay launched its own media network, powered by Yahoo DSP, to help advertisers reach shoppers across the web and in-store, in September. The network has connected 240,000 Australian merchants to 6.9 million customers, generating $13.4 billion in sales across both online and offline channels. Yahoo DSP’s director of commercial and platforms Andrew Gilbert said a common misconception is that commerce media and retail media are the same. “When we talk about commerce media we’re talking about multiple merchants at one time and when we’re talking about retail media we’re talking about one singular retailer,” he said. Brands can deliver personalised ads, track sales, measure campaign performance and gain insights about their customers. Mehta said Afterpay is able to create “rich audience profiles” based on their purchases and “target” them with relevant messaging. “Leveraging all of that information, both online and offline, we’re able to create really rich audience profiles based on the signals we’re seeing,” he said. “It creates a more customised experience between the customer and the merchant, ideally driving stronger engagement and conversion rates with the brand.” Gilbert said there has been a significant amount of interest from media agencies. Afterpay has already ran a number of successful campaigns focussed on electronics, fashion, travel, entertainment and retail. One CTV campaign with a major retailer led to a 35% increase in basket size, a 2.3% rise in category share, and attracted 327,000 new customers to the brand. Mehta said commerce media provides advertisers and agencies valuable insights about peoples’ shopping habits. “The fact that we have 350 million transactions allows us to create a new offering which allows them to connect across multiple verticals, not just one. “Those nuggets are incredibly valuable to an advertiser and agency as they think about furthering their customer personas.” Gilbert said transaction level data is the future of identifiers. “This will allow marketers, retailers and brands to go after different segments because they actually understand who their consumer is, what they’re doing and where they are,” he said.
Qualcomm CEO say AI will be the new UI for devices, understanding context and seamlessly performing tasks in response to prompts, across multiple domains and apps
Qualcomm CEO Cristiano Amon said that AI is ushering in the next fundamental shift in how humans interact with technology, describing it as a “generation change” poised to reshape the tech landscape and redefine user experiences across devices. According to Amon, rather than navigating between different apps for specific tasks, users will interact with AI agents that understand context and can seamlessly perform tasks across multiple domains. “You’re going to have different inputs, whether it’s voice and audio, or text. … Every text that you write could be a prompt for a model and for an agent to understand what you do and then be ready to help you when you need help,” Amon explained. Amon emphasized that this transformation extends beyond smartphones to other devices, such as automobiles and wearable technology like AR glasses. He also described cars as “a new computing space” where agent-based interfaces are particularly well-suited, allowing drivers to interact naturally through voice and visual cues. Amon said AI as the new user interface could be ubiquitous within five years, with edge computing further hastening the transition. This on-device AI processing is what Amon referred to as “AI at the edge.” This approach offers advantages in speed, privacy, reliability and cost compared to cloud-based alternatives, he said.
Senate Banking Committee establishes a regulatory framework for stablecoin issuers (focus on non-interest bearing token), requiring 1:1 reserves and AML compliance
A stablecoin bill, the GENIUS Act, is headed to the full Senate after being advanced by an 18-6 vote in the Senate Banking Committee. The GENIUS Act is the most prominent stablecoin bill and proposes a regulatory balance between state and federal oversight that allows smaller issuers to operate under state supervision while placing larger stablecoin providers under federal jurisdiction, among other requirements. The vote puts bill on a “fast track” in the Senate, as it is a priority of President Donald Trump. “This legislation is a critical first step in establishing a safe and pro-growth regulatory framework that will unleash innovation and advance the President’s mission to make America the world capital of crypto,” Hagerty said. “I look forward to seeing this bill pass the Senate in the near future and ultimately signed into law by President Trump.” An opponent of the bill in its current form, Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., said that, without updates, the bill would ignore basic consumer protections, lack basic national security protections, and lack basic safeguards necessary to ensure that stablecoins “don’t blow up our entire financial system.”