This article provides summary of how payments are changing as technology changes and is adopted. Also, an update on AI ‘watermarking’.

India’s economy has, like most countries, been buffeted by unexpected shocks over the last few years. Cash was disrupted by the November 2016 demonetisation exercise and by the pandemic.

ATM Marketplace has identified three key areas for innovation for ATMs in 2024 – use of AI, video banking, and cash automation.

Leon Schumacher, from Digital Ekho, gave the opening talk at the AI & CB (Artificial Intelligence and Central Bank) online conference in December. For those new to AI, it provided a fast overview of what AI is and some of the issues connected to it.

However you want to cut it, NCR Atleos (Atleos) is big in all thing’s ATMs. Data as of 23 June 2023, used in its September 2023 investor day, showed that it had over 800,000 installed ATMs.

An International Monetary Fund paper uses data from Uganda to understand whether digital payment innovations, particularly mobile money payments, will increase financial inclusion and if it will reduce people’s preference for cash.

In 2023 we continued to cover cash, payments and Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDC). This article provides a swift summary of the year that was.

Even China isn’t immune from ‘less cash’. One bank, ICBC, has taken action in Taizhou in Jiangsu to remind people about the requirement for merchants to accept cash in its branches.

Whether you agree with Henry Ford, ‘History is bunk’, or George Santayana, ‘Those who don’t learn from history are doomed to repeat it’, a paper from the Department of Economic History at Uppsala University gives an interesting perspective on the risks of introducing a Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDC).

A Barbadian bank announced that it will introduce fees from 1 February.

Cash & Payment News™ (CPN) was first published in July 2018 as the successor to Payment News Quarterly. While Currency News™ focuses on the product that is ‘cash’, CPN has concentrated on the use of cash once issued.

The ECB is looking to sign five agreements worth about €1.1 billion for a four year pilot of a Digital Euro starting early 2025.

For the first time in years, cash usage has risen in the UK, and not by a small percentage. The British Retail Consortium conducts an annual Payments Survey which covers 35% of the UK’s retailers, and this is the first time since it started the survey in 2013 that it has seen an increase.

Digital payments can feel inevitable, sweeping all before them. A range of recent news items suggest this isn’t true.

Danmarks Nationalbank has carried out an analysis of the role of cash in a low cash usage society.

In addition to the British Retail Consortium providing detailed information on the cost of payments in the UK, the Payment Systems Regulator (PSR) has recommended a cap on cross-border interchange fees, following its market review of the fees.

We report all too frequently on payments system failures – see the end of this article for a recent example. But it is interesting that the Governor of the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) has recently chosen to draw attention to the performance and reliability of Australia’s new payments platform (NPP), particularly noting the need and priority of improving the ‘resilience of Australia’s payments and market infrastructure’.

Perhaps a minority story, but a real life example of the strange things people do with banknotes. In Uganda, there is a trend for florists to design bouquets using banknotes.

The Chief Minister for Bengal has questioned the government’s focus on cashless transactions.

Mastercard’s Asia-Pacific lead for blockchain and digital assets has spoken about CBDCs in the region. He argues that consumers are so comfortable with existing payment options that a CBDC is not justified.