It was easy to lose track of it in the midst of all the impacts of the novel coronavirus, but a crucial federal lawsuit filed six months ago still hangs over the payments industry, carrying far-reaching implications for nearly all players. It’s PayPal Holdings Inc.’s action against the Consumer Financial Protection Agency over the CFPB’s final prepaid rule, and while it very much hasn’t gone away, some experts are worried its eventual resolution could hold very different implications from those they were expecting before PayPal brought its suit.
“We could be facing a different kind of environment by the time the case is rendered than we’re in today,” notes Ben Jackson, chief operating officer at the Innovative Payments Association, a Washington, D.C.-based trade group (Jackson also authors the monthly Payments 3.0 column for Digital Transactions). “That’s kind of what has us uncomfortable. We don’t feel people are talking enough about this case.”