Chase Paymentech reports that sales volume and the number of transactions conducted at 10 of the largest U.S. retail Web sites rose 29 percent during the 2007 year-end holiday shopping period according to data tracked by its Chase Paymentech Pulse Index.

The Payment Card Center of the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia has posted the latest edition of its Update quarterly newsletter along with several new papers.

BasePoint Analytics has announced the launch of its Recovery Optimization Program for credit and debit card issuers that provides them with "proven methods and techniques to increase the amount they recover on fraudulent transactions." BasePoint says the program can "increase issuer recovery rates to as much as 50% of the initial claims of fraud, whereas current industry average recovery rates are only up to 30%."

Dave Birch, in a post titled "Getting cash on the web", talks about getting cash on the web but he's really talking about innovation in payments and where it's happening (or not). He points out that PayPal, for example, can hardly be called an "alternative" payment system any more - given how significant it has become for ecommerce payments. At Glenbrook, we recently made the same determination - moving PayPal out of the "Emerging Payments" module in out Payments Boot Camp.

Metavante has announced it plans to acquire BenSoft Incorporated and its product, RepayMe. Metavante will integrate RepayMe into its existing Healthcare Payment Solutions suite of products. According to Metavante, "RepayMe software provides a Web-based tool for individuals who participate in various benefit programs to easily obtain reimbursement for eligible expenses that are covered by their benefit plans."

Citigroup has announced a net loss for the 2007 fourth quarter of $9.83 billion with the results including a "$18.1 billion in pre-tax write-downs and credit costs on sub-prime related direct exposures in fixed income markets, and a $4.1 billion increase in credit costs in U.S. consumer primarily related to higher current and estimated losses on consumer loans."

Citi said that its "U.S. consumer credit costs increased $4.1 billion, comprised of $689 million in higher net credit losses and a net charge of $3.31 billion to increase loan loss reserves. ... The increase in credit costs primarily reflected a weakening of leading credit indicators, including increased delinquencies on 1st and 2nd mortgages, unsecured personal loans, credit cards, and auto loans."

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