Visa USA has announced that consumer spending in electronics, home furnishings, grocery and drug stores helped boost overall sales during the Thanksgiving holiday weekend supporting Visa’s original projection of 7.5 percent growth (including gas and restaurant purchases) in overall retail sales for the 2006 holiday season.

comScore Networks has released data on consumer online non-travel (retail) spending at U.S. sites for Cyber Monday and the 2006 holiday season to date. Cyber Monday, which marks the first major spike in online holiday spending as people returned to work after the Thanksgiving weekend, saw slightly higher than expected gains. Cyber Monday sales totaled $608 million, up 26 percent versus the same day last year. During the first 27 days of November this year, total online retail spending reached $9.48 billion, marking a 24-percent increase versus the corresponding days in 2005.

The Census Bureau of the Department of Commerce has announced that the estimate of U.S. retail e-commerce sales for the third quarter of 2006, adjusted for seasonal variation and holiday and trading-day differences, but not for price changes, was $27.5 billion, an increase of 4.5 percent (±1.5%) from the second quarter of 2006. Total retail sales for the third quarter of 2006 were estimated at $991.7 billion, an increase of 0.7 percent (±0.3%) from the second quarter of 2006. The third quarter 2006 e commerce estimate increased 20.9 percent (±5.3%) from the third quarter of 2005 while total retail sales increased 5.1 percent (±0.3%) in the same period. E-commerce sales in the third quarter of 2006 accounted for 2.8 percent of total sales.

David Wethe reports for the Star-Telegram on airline-issued gift cards. According to Wethe, "America West, now owned by U.S. Airways, was the first airline to offer gift cards." Now every major airline seems to be selling them.

The Washington Post reports on a decision yesterday by U.S. District Judge James Robertson who said that "by keeping all U.S. currency the same size and texture, the government has denied blind people meaningful access to money." He ordered the government to develop ways for the blind to tell bills apart - saying that many other countries "vary their bills in size according to denomination, and every other issuer includes at least some features that help the visually impaired." The text of the judge's order is available online (PDF).

The Financial Times reports that yesterday Bank of America passed Citigroup as the world's largest financial services company as measured by market capitalization.

• USC-Annenberg Digital Future Project: Online World As Important to Internet Users As Real World?
• RSA Access Control and Risk-Based Authentication Integration Enables Cost-Effective Protection for Web Portals
• CodePartners Brings Remote Deposit Capture to Small and Medium Sized Businesses
• Microsoft Windows Vista Enables Strong Enterprise Security With Gemalto Secure Personal Devices
• Nokia and Yahoo! Extend Internet Experience to the Mobile Mass Market
• Over 100 Banks Use VASCO's Strong User Authentication in the U.S.A.