ACCEPTANCE & PROCESSING

• PayPal launches a new solution for SMEs in the UK. The PayPal Complete Payments solution provides small businesses in the UK with the capability to accept various payment methods, including PayPal, Buy Now, Pay Later solutions, Apple Pay, Google Pay, credit and debit cards, and alternative payment methods from around the world.
• JP Morgan joins French payments network Cartes Bancaires, enabling its merchant clients to process card payments via the French network rather than Visa or Mastercard.

BNPL

• NatWest ditches BNPL, The bank will begin closing BNPL accounts from May after lower than expected take up. 

CORPORATE ACTIVITY

• Klarna in talks for US IPO. Klarna is considering seeking a valuation of around $20 billion
• Monzo’s new funding round rises valuation to USD 5 bln. Monzo has raised USD 431.26 million at a USD 5.07 billion valuation to expand and introduce new products.
• Nationwide to buy Virgin Money for £2.9 billion, to expand into business banking.
• UniCredit hit with £2.3 million fine for data breach. The 2018 cyber attack on the bank’s mobile banking platform impacted the data over 750,000 customers.

EMBEDDED FINANCE

• ChargeAfter launches white-label embedded POS lending platform for banks, a hub that lets banks create, manage, and distribute any lending product from one centralised platform.

REALTIME/INSTANT PAYMENTS

• Sweden joins TIPS. Swedish market participants are settling instant payments in Swedish kronor in the Eurosystem TARGET Instant Payment Settlement (TIPS), after a successful migration. Sweden is the first non-euro area country to join TIPS with its national currency.

REGULATION (EU)

• Irish central bank sets new payments strategy, amid concerns that banks are failing to grasp the opportunities presented by instant payments. To overcome inertia, the Central bank has proposed four high-level priorities, to ensure that Irish consumers and small businesses benefit from payment innovations that exist elsewhere in Europe, to ensure cash remains available. The remining two priorities focus on maintaining resilience and security in payments