PayPal unveils Square rival

PayPal has taken the wraps off its Square rival, named “PayPal Here” offering small businesses a free dongle and app that allows them to accept card payments with their mobile phones.

According to David Marcus, Vice President of PayPal’s Mobile unit, “PayPal Here” is the world’s first global mobile payment solution that allows small businesses to accept almost any form of payment. This includes accepting payments by swiping cards with a fully encrypted thumb-sized card reader, or use a phone camera to scan and process cards and checks. It also allows them to invoice directly from the mobile app and, of course, accept PayPal in a brand new way.

The service turns any iPhone, and soon Android smartphone, into a mobile payment solution.

PayPal Here offers a simple flat rate of 2.7% for card swipes and PayPal payments. Merchants are also given a business debit card for quick access to their funds and 1% cash back on eligible purchases.

PayPal Here is currently available to select merchants in the United States, Canada, Australia and Hong Kong. The service will be open to all other merchants in these countries in April.

PayPal to launch digital wallet in May

PayPal is readying its digital wallet for release in May, the company has announced. Some in the know say that PayPal’s new offering will be a competitor to Square's mobile payment device.

Sam Shrauger, vice president of global product and experience at PayPay, earlier this week presented PayPal's digital wallet at the South by Southwest Interactive (SXSWi) festival in Austin, Texas.

Many of the features on display have been known about for some time, including applications for letting people separate their purchase from their payment, switch from debit to credit cards post-transaction, build personal lists, collect coupons and set spending limits for particular consumables.

"It lets consumers do things with their money that have never been possible before," says Sam Shrauger, vice president, global product & experience, PayPal.

PayPal, has also invited reporters to a small-business event in San Francisco on Thursday. The company is expected to announce a competitor to Square, a credit-card reader that will reportedly charge slightly less than what Square charges, according to Bloomberg.

"This is what we'll be rolling out in May of this year to a lot of our consumer users," Shrauger said in a behind-the-scenes video of the new wallet.

In this two-part video Shrauger walks through his entire SXSW demo.

The iPad is for everything

You don’t have to understand German to enjoy this. What the young lady says is "Tell me dad, I have not even asked you. How do you enjoy the new iPad we gave you for your birthday?"

LIBOR – What it is and is it broken?

The London Interbank Offered Rate (LIBOR) has been a key financial benchmark for decades. It is one of the most important reference points of the global financial system.

LIBOR is the average interest rate that leading banks in London charge when lending to other banks. Banks borrow money for one day, one month, two months, six months, one year, etc., and they pay interest to their lenders based on certain rates. The Libor figure is an average of these rates.

Many financial institutions, mortgage lenders and credit card agencies track the rate, which is produced daily at 11 a.m. to fix their own interest rates which are typically higher than the Libor rate. As such, it is a benchmark for finance all around the world.

At the height of the financial crisis allegations emerged that the LIBOR calculation was not really all above board. These allegations have persisted and LIBOR is currently at the heart of a sprawling regulatory investigation into possible manipulation.

Learn more about LIBOR and the current investigation from the London Financial Times. Watch the VIDEO HERE.

Online financial training courses for bankers & finance professionals

Ethan Hathaway now offer a comprehensive range of online training courses designed especially for bankers and financial professionals.

These on-demand self-study training courses allow you access online 24 hours per day, 7 days a week and give you the opportunity to study at your own pace and in the comfort of your own home or work-place.

You can get more details of Ethan Hathaway’s on-line training courses at http://www.ethanhathaway.com/online-courses/

Below is a sample module of the recently released “Operational Risk & Basel Certificate - Level 1”. This online training course gives you a comprehensive introduction and understanding of managing operational risk in a bank environment.



For more information about Ethan Hathaway visit http://www.ethanhathaway.com/

Here come discounts via hashtags - American Express syncs cards to Twitter

American Express is offering cardholders the ability to sync their Amex cards to Twitter so that when they tweet using special offer hashtags, couponless savings are loaded directly to their cards.

Cardmembers can tweet their way to savings by linking an eligible American Express card with Twitter at sync.americanexpress.com/twitter.

The card scheme has created @amexsync, an automated notification handle that is activated when someone sends a Tweet that includes one of the special offer hashtags. The handle detects if a user is already synced and either confirms their offer enrollment or provides an enrollment link to join the scheme. Additionally, if an offer is no longer available, @amexsync will direct users to check out the Tweets @americanexpress has "favourited" to find the latest offers. Questions or additional assistance will be provided by @askamex, the American Express customer service team on Twitter.

Merchants participating in the program (being rolled out in Texas this coming week) include 1-800-Flowers, Best Buy, Century 21 Department Store, The Cheesecake Factory, Dell, FedEx Office, FTD, Gulf, H&M, McDonald's, Seamless.com, Sports Authority, Ticketmaster, Virgin America, Whole Foods Market and Zappos.

American Express says it will provide merchant partners with detailed reporting about the online and offline spend behavior of their customers.

American Express last month partnered with Twitter to give away $1 million in free advertising to small businesses who sign up for a new promotional service on the microblogging Web site which is scheduled to launch late March.

PayPal integrates into “Tabbedout” mobile app

Tabbedout is a service that enables customers to open, view and pay a bar or restaurant tab using their mobile phone.

Tabbedout, a Texas-based start-up, has developed free iPhone and Android apps that enable users to pay tabs at around 400 participating restaurants and bars using their mobiles.

Once the app has been download and after enrolling using ones credit card details, users can locate outlets that accept the app and get GPS directions. Once at a bar, customers open a tab in the app and are given a code to share with the server or bartender.

As soon as the tab is opened, “Tabbedout” securely encrypts the customer name and credit card number and sends it electronically to the restaurant or bar's point-of-sale system. When the customer wants to settle up, they can view the details, enter a tip, split the bill, select the card they want to use and hit “pay tab”.

The new version will now allow customers to enter their PayPal username and password or PIN and mobile number to settle up, rather than using a credit card.

The new PayPal integration version will roll out in early March to select Tabbedout locations in Austin, Texas.