What shapes consumer transactions and payment technologies, and where is it going?
Any conventional wisdom about payments—how they’re made, the currencies being used, the cards presently in favor—doesn’t last long before the next wave of technology, innovation, and regulation. Javelin’s analysts conduct research at the forefront of payments, identifying the emerging trends for financial services companies and payments providers and offering insight into how they can best position themselves not just for what is current but also for what is coming.
Payments Research
Reports
The Case for Card Networks’ Embrace of Interoperability
Card networks are at a crossroads after decades of dominance. New payment methods and heightened regulatory scrutiny are eroding the competitive advantage Visa, Mastercard, American Express, and Discover have historically enjoyed. This combinati...
What We Can Learn From Merchant Services M&A Activity in 2022 and 2023
Mergers and acquisitions in payments and merchant services have slowed amid tough economic conditions and the fallout from the FIS-Worldpay deal, which just didn’t work out. Against that backdrop, M&A activity in those spaces is under increasing...
What the Fall of Crypto-Friendly Banks Means for the Market
The collapses of three cryptocurrency-friendly financial institutions demonstrate the issues that face crypto companies and their providers of financial services. Crypto-focused and related companies can still move toward opportunities by promot...
Return to Office Doesn’t Equal Return to Patterns in Prepaid Transit
Return-to-office mandates and hybrid work scenarios have created new patterns for commuters throughout the United States. This may change payment patterns from exclusively prepaid transit products to a broader variety of prepaid and postpaid opt...
B2B E-Commerce in the U.S. Market
The next generation of buyers is likely drawn from Millennials and/or Generation Z. Younger generations expect digital experiences in their buying journey that are reminiscent of business-to-consumer (B2C) interactions. The marketplace model has...
Stripe, FIS, and Afterpay and the Search for Profitability and Flexibility
The struggles of FIS (which opted to spin off Worldpay, an acquisition it made to much fanfare four years ago), Stripe (which is seeking money at a greatly reduced valuation), and Afterpay (which abandoned a buy now, pay later market amid tough ...
Bitcoin Mining and ESG: The States Start Moving
New York was the first state to impose restrictions on bitcoin mining, but it won’t be the last. Oregon and Washington are lining up their own legislation, highlighting the industry’s environmental, social, and governance challenges. Still other...
Cobranded Credit Cards 2023
The cobranded card market is a way to generate loyalty, scale your portfolio, and service the next generation of cardholders.
Unused Value in Prepaid Cards: Breaking the Misconceptions
Unused funds on prepaid products, such as gift cards, create liabilities for issuing organizations as use grows. The increasing use of such products highlights the opportunities for consumers and retailers to benefit before any potential regulat...
Health of Payments
This report, sponsored by NCR, explores consumer payment preferences, examining how consumers prefer to pay and how multiple types of payments are finding ways to capture spend across different purchase instances. Credit cards may be consumers’ ...