Antitrust Group

Payments News Update – December 20, 2024

Legal and Regulatory Developments SPOTLIGHT: FTC Cracks Down on Hotel Junk Fees Hotel Dive – December 17, 2024 The Federal Trade Commission on Tuesday announced a final Rule on Unfair or Deceptive Fees, or “Junk Fees Rule,” that targets “bait-and-switch pricing” for short-term lodging and live-ticket events. The rule requires up-front disclosure of total prices including fees, so that consumers...

Payments News Update – December 13, 2024

Legal and Regulatory Developments SPOTLIGHT: Europe Wants UK to Reconsider Proposal to Cap Credit Card Fees Bloomberg – December 12, 2024 (subscription may be required) A top UK regulator is facing pushback from European lawmakers as it continues to weigh new rules to restrict how much British merchants must pay in credit-card fees on online purchases by consumers from the continent. Members of the...

Payments News Update – December 6, 2024

Legal and Regulatory Developments SPOTLIGHT: Musk Calls for End to CFPB Banking Dive – November 27, 2024  Business mogul and presumed Trump Cabinet appointee Elon Musk called for the elimination of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, in a post Wednesday on social media platform X, which he owns. “Delete CFPB. There are too many duplicative regulatory agencies,” Musk wrote. The consumer...

Payments News Update – November 22, 2024

Legal and Regulatory Developments SPOTLIGHT: A Senate Panel Sends a Signal: Time to Cut a Deal on Swipe Fees Digital Transactions News – November 20, 2024  Members of the Senate Judiciary Committee told representatives of Visa Inc., Mastercard Inc., and the merchant community on Tuesday it was time to “negotiate” an end to their decades-old dispute over credit card swipe fees. The comments came during...

Payments News Update – November 15, 2024

Legal and Regulatory Developments SPOTLIGHT: Swipe Fees Get Renewed Washington Focus in Aftermath of Election American Banker – November 12, 2024 (subscription required) Sens. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., and Roger Marshall, R-Kan., will hold a long-awaited hearing on pending swipe fee legislation. Executives from Visa and Mastercard, the two card networks most impacted by the bill, however, are not listed to...

Payments News Update – November 8, 2024

Legal and Regulatory Developments SPOTLIGHT: Is Visa a Debit Monopolist? Digital Transactions Magazine – November 1, 2024 Lawsuits alleging anti-competitive practices are nothing new to Visa Inc. After all, the network, as well as MasterCard Inc., have been sued by the Department of Justice, merchants, and state attorneys general for decades over their pricing and business practices. When the DoJ filed its...

Payments News Update – November 1, 2024

Legal and Regulatory Developments SPOTLIGHT: Chopra Defends CFPB Open Banking Rule in Face of Lawsuit Payments Dive – October 28, 2024 Consumer Financial Protection Bureau Director Rohit Chopra said on Sunday that a lawsuit filed over the agency’s open banking rule finalized earlier this month is an obstacle to increasing competition among financial institutions. Some banks are concerned about competing...

Payments News Update – October 25, 2024

Legal and Regulatory Developments SPOTLIGHT: Visa Wanted a Vast Empire. First, It Had to Beat Back Its Foes. The Wall Street Journal – October 19, 2024 (subscription may be required) Visa is winning the decadeslong battle for control over how U.S. consumers pay for everything. It got here in part by paying for competition to go away and by using fees as weapons to make partners bend to its wishes. One by...

Payments News Update – October 18, 2024

Legal and Regulatory Developments SPOTLIGHT: Australia’s Pesky Fee for Debit Card Purchases May Be About to Disappear. What Happens Next? The Guardian – October 15, 2024 It might be chump change when it comes to buying a coffee, but the surcharge on debit purchases adds up to billions of dollars a year – and it could be about to disappear. Australia’s payments sector could be overhauled amid a...

Payments News Update – October 11, 2024

Legal and Regulatory Developments SPOTLIGHT: Visa Expected to Temper Competitive Moves After DOJ Action Payments Dive – October 3, 2024 Visa’s retail clients and fintech competitors may find their market positions strengthened in the wake of the federal government filing an antitrust lawsuit against the card network last week, industry players say. Federal prosecutors alleged that Visa, the largest U.S....