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NewsBriefs

This article contains summaries of news stories recently posted under TabaPay seeks bank charter through
Breaking Industry News on our homepage. For links to these and other Transact Bank acquisition
full news stories, please visit www.greensheet.com/breakingnews.php.
Denver-based TabaPay plans to acquire Transact Bank,
N.A., combining banking and payments capabilities as
the money movement platform expands its services. The
proposed acquisition, subject to regulatory approval, is
expected to close in the fourth quarter of 2026, after which
the OCC-chartered, FDIC-insured bank would become
TabaBank N.A. TabaPay revealed the deal alongside $155
million in strategic growth financing led by FTV Capital.

TabaBank would complement TabaPay's existing network
Nuvei to pay $4.85 million in of more than 20 partner banks while providing additional
FTC merchant-screening case redundancy and supporting RTP, FedNow, ACH, wires
and card sponsorship. TabaPay said the bank could also
Nuvei agreed to pay $4.85 million to settle Federal Trade strengthen sponsorship capabilities for merchants, ISOs,
Commission allegations that it processed payments for payfacs and other platforms. The company expects to pro-
merchants it knew or should have known were engaged cess more than $100 billion in payments volume this year.
in deceptive conduct.
FTC follows Nuvei case with
The FTC alleged Nuvei processed more than $30 million $12 million Humboldt settlement
for offshore tech support operation Reimage and main-
tained accounts for other high-risk merchants despite Humboldt Merchant Services agreed to pay $12 million
fraud and chargeback concerns. The proposed order re- and accept business restrictions to settle Federal Trade
stricts Nuvei from serving certain tech support providers Commission allegations that it knowingly facilitated pay-
and merchants on Mastercard's high-risk list and requires ment processing for more than 1,000 sham merchants
enhanced screening and monitoring of prospective and linked to unauthorized billing schemes. The FTC alleged
existing clients. the registered ISO opened accounts for shell companies de-
spite warning signs, including unusually high chargeback
Nuvei also must investigate clients whose chargeback rates, and helped merchants evade card-network monitor-
rates exceed specified thresholds. FTC officials empha- ing through practices including load balancing. Humboldt
sized that processors are not automatically liable for mer- also allegedly moved accounts to a lower-risk bank identi-
chant misconduct but may face enforcement when they fication number to increase transaction approvals.
know, should know or consciously avoid knowing that
merchants are engaged in unlawful conduct through pay- Under the settlement, Humboldt is barred from processing
ment processing services. for straw companies, certain merchants on Mastercard's
MATCH list and merchants subject to law enforcement ac-
Alabama limits surcharging tion. The order also prohibits credit card laundering and
as Australia moves to end it efforts to evade fraud monitoring and risk controls.
Card surcharge rules are changing in Alabama and Aus- Consumer trust in AI shopping? A mixed bag
tralia. Effective Sept. 1, 2026, Alabama requires sales tax to A Visa survey found 72 percent of U.S. consumers have
be calculated on a purchase before a credit card surcharge used an AI assistant for shopping, but only 23 percent
or convenience fee is added, departing from the approach trust generative AI to handle payments on their behalf.
used in most states.
Trust increased when established payment brands were
involved, with 61 percent of respondents saying they
Industry observers said the change could affect merchants would trust Visa to handle agentic transactions. That fig-
and payments providers supporting surcharge programs. ure rose to 68 percent among consumers ages 18 to 34 and
Australia, meanwhile, will eliminate card surcharging 71 percent among frequent AI users.
Oct. 1 after regulators concluded the practice no longer ef-
fectively encourages consumers to choose lower-cost pay- The Harris Poll survey of 2,065 U.S. adults was conducted
ment methods. May 26 to 28, 2026. Visa said the findings suggest consum-
ers distinguish between AI tools used for product dis-
The Reserve Bank of Australia estimates consumers pay covery and brands trusted to complete transactions. The
AUD $1.6 billion to $1.8 billion annually in surcharges. company expects agentic commerce will extend beyond
Regulators are also reducing interchange caps, including consumer shopping into business applications including
cutting the consumer credit card cap from 80 to 30 basis procurement, supplier onboarding, invoicing, machine-
points, and introducing greater transparency around mer- to-machine payments and embedded commerce.
chant card processing costs.

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