A new study titled "Who Pays? The Winners and Losers of Credit Card Deregulation" published by the non-partisan research center Demos examines who bears the cost of credit card deregulation. According to Demos, the study "reveals how low-income families, African Americans, Latinos and single females bear a disproportionate amount of the cost to subsidize "competitive" credit card offers by paying excessive fees and high interest rates."

Byron Acohido and Jon Swartz write for USA Today about magnetic stripe skimming and counterfeiting of credit cards using the plastic from open loop gift cards.

TowerGroup has announced a new research report titled "Mobile Peer-to-Peer Payments: Verizon Wireless and Obopay Take a Short Step Down a Long Road" that finds that "while online peer-to-peer payments and their mobile counterparts are not new to the payments arena, the use of mobile devices to exchange payments between consumers is still in its infancy. The newly announced deal between Verizon Wireless and Obopay is novel, given the fact that a major U.S. mobile operator has chosen to partner with a startup technology vendor to support peer-to-peer payments by means of a downloadable application on mobile phones."

Javelin Strategy and Research has announced its "2007 Card Issuers’ Identity Safety Scorecard" - including describing "the security features of a dream credit card that put consumers in the driver’s seat when it comes to protecting them from identity fraud and knowing exactly what’s happening with their accounts. Javelin also announced the top credit card issuers that provide the best features that prevent, detect and resolve identity fraud."

MasterCard has announced financial results for second quarter of 2007 reporting net revenues of $997 million, up 17.8% over the same quarter last year of which about 2% of the growth was due to currency fluctuation. MasterCard's gross dollar volume grew 13.3% to $555 billion while transactions processed grew 15.2% to 4.6 billion. Worldwide purchase volume rose 14.8%, on a local currency basis, during the quarter to $414 billion. MasterCard's presentation on its 2Q07 results is available online.

In a post titled "Who will pay? And how?", Dave Birch blogs about the emerging payment alternatives for eCommerce payments (PayPal, Bill Me Later, and Google Checkout) and suggests that merchants who have become increasingly frustrated about the costs of traditional payment card acceptance now have new choices available.

Michael Arrington reports for TechCrunch that Amazon.com is expected to soon launch "a new web service around payments" that he expects will compete with both Google Checkout and PayPal for ecommerce payments.

Last week, Visa Inc. updated its SEC filings to include several exhibits to its original filing - including Visa USA's Master Agreement with JP Morgan Chase, its Amended and Restated Agreement with Bank of America, and various loss sharing agreements between Visa USA and certain of its member banks relating to pending litigation.

ID Analytics has announced the "results of new analytical research on U.S. identity fraud by geography. The research, which is based on actual and attempted frauds rather than on consumer victim reports, examined data from January through December 2006 to determine where identity fraud is most rapidly increasing."

Ian Kehoe writes for the Irish Business Times that Dublin-based PayPal International "has moved a significant portion of its business to Singapore for accounting and taxation purposes."

Ellen Roseman writes for the Toronto Star about printed credit card receipts in Canada - apparently many still contain the cardholder's full 16-digit account number and expiration data.

• FEED Becomes Mocapay, Heightens Commitment to Standardizing Mobile Payments
• Citi and Obopay Deliver First Mobile Payment Service to Chicagoland Consumers
• Adams County National Bank Joins PULSE with Exclusive PIN Debit Agreement, Plans Discover® Debit Issuance
• Online-Payment Service BidPay Launches API
• My Cause: SunTrust Promotion Offers Clients Unique Choice for Cash Incentives
• First Data International Completes Acquisition of POLCARD
• preCharge Issues 1st Annual Chargeback Report
• Forrester: Health Savings Accounts: The Battleground For Customer Loyalty
• Slate and OPEN from American Express® to Launch New Interactive Features for Small Business
• Bank Technology News: Small Business Payments: Big Hitters Make a PASS
• What is Visa’s role in credit card processing?
• CPA Technology Advisor: What’s eFFICIENT, eFFECTIVE & eCONOMICAL? It’s eBANKING!
• Kuala Lumpur: MasterCard offers antifraud classes

We have received news of the following recent management changes:

• Scott Lewer has been named General Manager and Executive Vice President of ReD USA, a division of Retail Decisions. Previously, Lewer was Vice President of Business Development at First Data International (FDI).