Healthy Alternatives to Cookies Life After Third-Party Cookies DCA members gathered in San Francisco last week to talk about the future of payments and offers – with deep dives into the potential and present impact of generative AI, the persistent challenge of transactional friction, the possibilities of loyalty-as-a-service and similar offerings, and a discussion of how to gather and use...

Subscription Loyalty Programs Subscription models are very profitable – until they’re not. Will consumers keep signing up? Several DCA members have mentioned subscription loyalty programs to me in conversation lately – a strategic option, a competitive threat, a thing that has to be considered.  The promise of loyal customers and steady, recurring revenue has all sorts of companies asking themselves:...

DCA Strategy Sprint: Open Banking Twelve DCA members white-boarded the business opportunities created by open banking. On Wednesday, a dozen DCA member executives worked together to brainstorm and document the business opportunities that will be created by the full implementation of open finance principles.  Like our November Strategy Sprint on tech disruption, the session was an opportunity to look into...

2022 DCA Industry Study Shows Strong Annual Growth More than one-third of respondents report card-linking growth rates up more than 100 percent HERNDON, Va. (Dec. 19, 2022)—The Digital Commerce Alliance (DCA) released 2022 data revealing industry trends related to the card-linking, mobile wallet, and financial data space at the annual DCA Summit held earlier this month. Among the global trade...

2022 DCA Industry Study Shows Strong Annual Growth More than one-third of respondents report card-linking growth rates up more than 100 percent HERNDON, Va. (Dec. 19, 2022)—The Digital Commerce Alliance (DCA) released 2022 data revealing industry trends related to the card-linking, mobile wallet, and financial data space at the annual DCA Summit held earlier this month. Among the global trade...

A Fast & Furious Two-Hour Conversation On Thursday, November 17th, 15 DCA executives did a “strategy sprint” to assess tech disruption. Here are a few observations. You may have taken our five-minute tech disruption survey.  We used it to lay the groundwork for a “strategy sprint”.  Fifteen executives from a dozen DCA member companies worked together to assess which technologies...

Is Business Travel About to Stall?  After virtually disappearing in early 2020, business travelers are again booking trips to meetings, conferences, and events. Global business travel was a $1.4 trillion industry in 2019 – but conflicting focuses have experts guessing at how long it will take for business travel to return to that level. Currently, the Global Business Travel Association...

Consumer Spending Strained Spending is down in the US for household items like furniture and electronics, as food, gasoline and other essentials have become more expensive. Retailers including Walmart and Best Buy are expecting to feel the pinch. DCA Insight: The change in spending habits is uneven. Many people are dining out and traveling more after not being able to during...

DCA’s Top 20 Women in Digital Commerce 2022  Twenty outstanding women executives in the digital commerce space have been recognized by the Digital Commerce Alliance (DCA) for leadership and achievement.   The global non-profit trade association, DCA, selected these senior-level individuals based on their innovative approaches to advance their organizations and the digital commerce industry. DCA members include Sam’s Club, Bank of America,...

Retailers Trim Sales Forecasts Large retailers including Target, Walmart and Kohls are increasing sales at slower rates than they did at the height of the pandemic. Rising rates of inflation are driving shoppers to curb purchases of discretionary items in favor of staples like groceries. DCA Insight: Spending pull-back has been sharper than predicted. Consumer wallets are being squeezed, driving...

AI Helps FinTech Firms Reach More Borrowers  Fintech lenders including Pentadata Inc., OppFi Inc. and LoanSnap are helping traditionally underserved borrowers get loans. These companies feed a wider range of data and use AI to determine credit eligibility, giving more people access to the credit market. It has been crucial for these fintechs to be able to have access to...

Russia’s Financial System: Visa & Mastercard Sanctions Western economic sanctions disrupted Russia’s financial system, with one exception, the WSJ reported. Russian consumers continued to use their Mastercard and Visa cards, even though these two organizations exited the country as the war began. Why? Payments made by these cards issued in Russia aren’t processed via U.S. networks, but rather through a...