Latest from Finextra
Finextra
13 hours ago
- Business
- Finextra
UK tribunals rules Visa and Mastercard fees breach competition law
The UK's Competition Appeal Tribunal has ruled that Visa and Mastercard's multilateral interchange fees charged to retailers breach European competition law. 0 This content has been selected, created and edited by the Finextra editorial team based upon its relevance and interest to our community. The unanimous ruling on linked lawsuits brought by merchants, marks the latest stage in a years-long dispute over card fees retailers pay to the two US payments giants. David Scott, global managing partner, Scott+Scott, which represented the claimants, told Reuters the ruling was "a significant win for all merchants who have been paying excessive interchange fees to Visa and Mastercard". Both firm's intend to appeal. A Mastercard spokesperson told Reuters: "Mastercard strongly disagrees with today's decision, which is deeply flawed, and will seek permission to appeal."
Finextra
14 hours ago
- Business
- Finextra
Zurich expands Cowbell collaboration
Cowbell, a leading provider of cyber insurance for small to medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and middle-market businesses, today announced a major expansion of its product portfolio to include a comprehensive multi-line insurance offering from Zurich North America (Zurich) within the United States. 0 This content is provided by an external author without editing by Finextra. It expresses the views and opinions of the author. Building on its established success in Cyber and Technology Errors & Omissions (Tech E&O), Cowbell has collaborated with Zurich to offer Zurich Select Plus through the E&S distribution channel for small to medium-sized private businesses. Zurich Select Plus is a co-branded modular suite of four coverages: Directors & Officers (D&O), Employment Practices Liability (EPL), Crime, and Fiduciary insurance. With this launch, Cowbell now offers cyber, technology errors and omissions, and management liability coverage through both a fully integrated API and a proprietary agentic email automation platform. The move mirrors Cowbell's recent diversification in the UK, where it introduced professional indemnity insurance tailored for technology providers. Together, these initiatives reflect the company's vision to scale its tech-enabled platform globally and deliver intelligent insurance solutions to businesses wherever they operate. 'In cyber insurance, we've earned a reputation for underwriting discipline, broad distribution, and a user-friendly experience,' said Jack Kudale, Founder and CEO of Cowbell. 'Cyber remains one of the most complex risks facing businesses today. By leveraging our first-of-its-kind, vertically integrated, AI-powered platform and proprietary risk modeling, we've simplified the process, enabling faster, more streamlined transactions for our broker partners. Now, we've aligned with Zurich to bring innovation to additional lines of coverage, further advancing our mission to provide comprehensive, tech-forward insurance to the global SME and middle-market segment.' The launch of Zurich Select Plus follows Cowbell's announcement, nearly a year ago, that it had secured a $60 million Series C investment led by Zurich Insurance Group. 'At the one-year mark of Zurich's investment in Cowbell, we are pleased to offer our industry-leading Zurich Select Plus product for D&O, EPL, Fiduciary, and Crime coverages. Through Cowbell's digital platform, the Zurich Cowbell collaboration and relationship can provide bindable quotes within seconds of receiving the required underwriting information,' said Kristof Terryn, CEO of Zurich North America. 'This growing alliance is just one of many ways Zurich is a transformative risk advisor and manager for businesses, including small and medium-sized enterprises.' At the heart of this evolution is Cowbell's agentic email automation platform, representing a seismic shift in submission processing. Using large language model (LLM) agents, the platform automates submission workflows by extracting, enriching, and validating data from emails, attachments, and images. Cowbell's cyber, management, and professional liability programs are available to select agents and brokers in the United States.
Finextra
14 hours ago
- Business
- Finextra
Bolt launches support for stablecoin payments
Bolt, the checkout, identity and payments platform, today announced Bolt Connect, a new product designed to help marketplaces onboard merchants faster, streamline operations and scale with fewer resources. 0 This content is provided by an external author without editing by Finextra. It expresses the views and opinions of the author. Bolt Connect gives marketplace operators a single integration to support one-click merchant onboarding, built-in compliance workflows, and low-fee or no-fee payouts. With Bolt managing the infrastructure, marketplaces can grow more efficiently while controlling their own brand experience and business model. The company also announced support for stablecoin payments, giving merchants and shoppers enhanced flexibility through new digital payment infrastructure. "Marketplaces shouldn't have to choose between scale and simplicity," said Ryan Breslow, Founder and CEO of Bolt. "With Bolt Connect, we're giving them the tools to grow without the usual technical burden, while stablecoin support opens the door to faster, borderless payments for everyone in the network." Bolt Connect: Built for Marketplaces Bolt Connect is designed to manage costly and time-intensive commerce infrastructure for marketplaces. It enables them to easily onboard and support sellers—whether they have 10 or 10,000—without significant development work and resources. Bolt handles the compliance, payouts, and infrastructure behind the scenes, giving marketplaces a clean path to scale while maintaining a seamless experience for both merchants and end users. Stablecoins: Faster, Cheaper, Global Payments Bolt's support for stablecoins will benefit both sides of the transaction. For merchants, it means faster settlement, lower transaction fees, and easier cross-border payouts—especially relevant for marketplaces using Bolt Connect. Stablecoins allow operators to move money globally without relying on banks or card networks. For shoppers, stablecoins offer a private, instant and borderless way to pay, no credit card, bank account or international fees required. These announcements follow a string of recent product launches from Bolt, part of the company's mission to make commerce easier for merchants and more intuitive for shoppers, regardless of platform, payment method or geography. Recent highlights include a strategic partnership with Palantir to launch Checkout 2.0, an AI-powered, personalized checkout experience that adapts in real time to shopper behavior and preferences, and the debut of Bolt's SuperApp, an all-in-one finance and crypto hub. It also recently launched Bolt Charge, a subscription solution that powers recurring payments for digital goods with no platform fees.
Finextra
16 hours ago
- Business
- Finextra
Moldovan bank maib signs with Tuub for Romanian ops
Tuum, the next-generation core banking platform, has announced today a strategic partnership with maib in Romania, where Moldova's largest bank looks at establishing its digital banking presence with asset-light retail-only offering. 0 Tuum's SaaS core banking platform will serve as the foundation for maib's greenfield operations in Romania. Maib selected Tuum in Romania after a comprehensive evaluation of leading core banking providers. Tuum stood out for its modularity, modern architecture, and rare ability to support agnostic deployment. This feature, enabling in-country deployment where necessary, was a key differentiator, future-proofing maib European data residency compliance as it scales. Jurgen de Ruijter, Head Representative of maib's operations in Romania, stated: 'Maib's decision to partner with Tuum came after a comprehensive evaluation of leading core banking platforms. Tuum was identified as the most modern, modular, and technologically advanced platform, setting it apart from other next-generation core banking solutions. We believe this solution supports us in our endeavour to build the next generation fintech.' Miljan Stamenkovic, Chief Revenue Officer at Tuum, commented: 'This is a milestone partnership for Tuum and a powerful validation of our platform's leadership in the European core banking market. Maib's expansion into Romania is one of the most ambitious digital banking initiatives in the region, and we're proud to support it with a solution engineered for speed, scalability, and compliance. Our agnostic deployment capability was a decisive factor—proving once again that flexibility is key in enabling banks to move fast and scale smart.' This deal highlights Tuum's leadership in enabling established financial institutions to execute 'launch and expand' strategies with modern, cloud-native technology. It reinforces Tuum's role as a strategic partner for ambitious digital banking ventures across Europe.
Finextra
16 hours ago
- Business
- Finextra
Intuit launches AI agents and fintech platform
Inc. (Nasdaq: INTU), the global financial technology platform that makes Intuit TurboTax, Credit Karma, QuickBooks, and Mailchimp, today announced a transformative set of proactive Intuit AI agents that will dramatically improve how businesses run and grow. 0 This content is provided by an external author without editing by Finextra. It expresses the views and opinions of the author. These agents will automate workflows and when combined with human experts will deliver real-time insights and improve cash flow for businesses. The new AI agents, embedded in the Intuit platform, create a more powerful QuickBooks that provides businesses with a virtual team working on their behalf while the customer is always in control. The agents transform how work is done and help customers grow, completing workflows across customer relationship management, financial analysis, payments, accounting, and more, saving businesses up to 12 hours a month.1 Their ability to seamlessly connect data across multiple applications proactively gives customers a 360-view of their business metrics and overall performance - all in one place. The result: 78% of customers say Intuit's AI makes it easier for them to run their business; and 68% state it allows them to spend more time growing their business.2 These AI agents are also able to work along-side trusted AI-enabled human experts to provide businesses with additional expertise and support. 'Intuit's AI-driven expert platform is transforming how businesses run and grow with first-of-its-kind agentic AI experiences,' said Sasan Goodarzi, Intuit CEO. 'When our vast amounts of data and AI capabilities are combined with the power of trusted human experts, Intuit's uniquely designed, integrated platform unlocks next-level efficiencies, profitability, and growth for businesses.' These new, done-for-you experiences are part of a completely redesigned and personalized QuickBooks web layout. The homepage is transformed into a striking display of customizable widgets with a powerful business feed that shows real-time intelligent insights, recommendations, and summarizes the workflows and tasks completed by the AI agents. Customers can seamlessly collaborate with human experts and connect to additional Intuit products, services, and third-party apps to truly realize the benefits and power of one integrated platform that drives next-level business efficiencies and growth, all in one place. In addition to the new web experience, the QuickBooks mobile app also has a new, modern interface that delivers the benefits of AI agents on the go. Introducing Intuit AI agents: A virtual team that does virtually everything Intuit's new AI agents will help businesses – at every stage – scale, enabling them to grow on a platform they know and trust. The AI agents complete day-to-day tasks, including managing customer leads, tracking payments, sending invoices, and reconciling a business's books. In addition, new, integrated collaboration tools allow a business owner and their accountant to seamlessly communicate and work together in QuickBooks. With the automation of workflows, collaboration with trusted experts, and the ability to deliver real-time, personalized, and actionable insights, businesses move faster, operate smarter, and uncover greater efficiencies and growth. • Payments Agent: Optimizes and grows cash flow by getting businesses paid an average of 5 days faster3 with tailored acceleration strategies that predict late payments, automate invoice tracking, and create and send invoices and reminders. • Accounting Agent: Automates bookkeeping and transaction categorization, and assists in reconciliation, delivering cleaner, more accurate books. • Finance Agent: Provides a comprehensive approach to the financial management of growing, mid-market businesses with robust reporting, KPI analysis, and scenario planning and forecasting based on performance and peer benchmarking, helping finance teams make smart decisions to achieve financial goals. 'I need more time to be able to invest back into my business,' said Kurtis Graham, founder, COSIGN Enterprises, LLC. 'Intuit's AI can help me save several hours a month and drive revenue for my business. That's a win-win for my business.' Customer Hub: AI agents that strengthen relationships and fuel business growth The Customer Hub, included in most QuickBooks Online plans, will provide two new virtual agents that automate and streamline the sales and customer relationship management (CRM) process, managing new leads and existing customers in one place to deliver delightful customer experiences and stronger relationships. • Customer Agent: Sources leads, drafts personalized email responses, suggests and schedules meetings based on engagement data, and tracks every customer opportunity in the sales cycle. • Marketing Agent: Coming later this year, it will automate audience management, campaign execution, and content creation to deliver impactful acquisition and retention marketing campaigns via Mailchimp. Intuit AI agents for growing businesses In the coming months, Intuit AI agents will be available for larger and growing businesses to tackle more complex tasks and boost productivity even further, enabling these businesses to scale with speed. • Payroll Agent: Proactively collects time and attendance data from your employees and runs payroll when you say so. • Project Management Agent: Manages project quotes, milestones, and budgets so businesses stay on track. For more than 40 years, Intuit has been leading the industry in delivering impactful customer experiences that help millions of consumers and businesses put more money in their pockets, helping them achieve their business and financial goals with less effort and complete confidence. The launch of Intuit's transformational AI agents is the latest innovation powered by Intuit's platform, bringing artificial intelligence and human intelligence together to power prosperity for its customers. Now, businesses and their accountants have access to a virtual team that saves them time, simplifies the day-to-day running of a business, and helps accountants more confidently and quickly advise clients on key decisions. Availability The new web and mobile interfaces, integrated AI agents and human experts, and Customer Hub will start rolling out today, July 1, to a range of QuickBooks Online products and customers in the US.
