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In the first newsletter of February, we see mobile payments continuing to go from strength to strength. First TfL confirmed that mobile payments now make up 3.5 per cent of all contactless transactions on London’s transport network and Barclays has finally indicated that it will work with Apple Pay sometime in the next couple of months. Elsewhere, we caught up with Nick Williamson, CEO and founder of Credits, who cleared up some misconceptions about Blockchain and considered the obstacles that banks would have to overcome when adopting the technology.

It’s been quite the ride for Barclays and Apple Pay. After initially not signing up for the tech giant’s payment service, on the day of its launch the bank performed a glorious U-turn by announcing that it would work with the mobile payment service in the near future. A short six months later, we finally have indication that Barclays will work on Apple Pay in March or April.

Transport for London has released detailed figures about people’s usage of contactless technology including findings such as there being 25,000 new contactless cards being used on the network every single day and mobile payments accounting for 3.5 per cent of all contactless journeys.

The UK is the fourth most digital-ready country according to the latest research from Citigroup and Imperial College London. Finland was top for the third year running whilst Singapore and the US came second and third respectively.

PaymentEye recently caught up with CEO and founder of Credits, Nick Williamson. His company is hybrid framework that provides interoperable, built-to-purpose blockchains. We spoke about the misconceptions surrounding the technology, its association with Bitcoin and actual practical applications.

In the first month, PaymentEye has explored several key payment trends. We have covered Big Data being a game changer in the world of mobile payments, contactless technology going from strength to strength, particularly in the world of transport, and cash having too many benefits to disappear. But what about the other, more left-field trends such as unattended payment solutions? This infographic breaks down Ingenico’s predictions for 2016.