Javelin Strategy and Research has announced a new report titled "Mobile Marketing: Financial Marketing Strategies to Engage the Mobile Consumer" to be available tomorrow. "58 Million US adults received at least one mobile marketing message on their mobile phones in the last year. Mobile marketing provides an opportunity for financial institutions (FIs) to interactively reach on-the-move consumers closer to the purchase decision in a one-to-one communication." READ MORE »

Global Payments has announced a joint venture with HSBC Bank to provide payment processing services to merchants in the United Kingdom and Internet merchants globally. The new company will operate under the name HSBC Merchant Services. READ MORE »

Juniper Research has announced a new report and forecast concluding that 41.5 billion mobile financial service transactions will be made by the end of 2011. Juniper finds that "the key drivers for these transactions will be the high speed of adoption by consumers of new mobile finance facilities -- particularly those currently without access to any form of banking." READ MORE »

Saying that "standards-based approaches to the provision of mobile financial services (MFS) move a step closer today", the Mobey Forum has announced a new document titled "Best Practice for Mobile Financial Services — Enrolment Business Model Analysis" that examines "the challenge of sharing a mobile handset's secure hardware, the so-called secure element." An accompanying slide set and an FAQ are also available. READ MORE »

In a press release this morning, payment processor Equens and supermarket chain Albert Heijn have announced they will begin a pilot with Tip2Pay - pay with your fingertip. Both a debit card and your fingertip must be presented at the point-of-sale. READ MORE »

Glenbrook's Bryan Derman reflects on last week's actions by the FDIC and the FTC against CompuCredit and its sponsoring banks - and wondering how this new focus by the regulators on the activities of third parties might affect some other bank businesses in the US.

In an article titled "Why Africa Is Banking on Cellphones", Mail & Guardian Online reports on the growth of mobile banking and how, for people in the developing world, the arrival of mobile banking -- or m-banking -- is potentially revolutionary.

"We wanted to offer something that would work," explained Mung Ki Woo, who heads Orange's m-payments division. "Instead of giving people a plastic card, why not use something many people already have: a cellphone? And instead of doing transactions at a bank branch, why not let people go to their local retailer to deposit and withdraw cash?"

Yodlee and Andera have announced that, in less than ten months, more than 30 financial institutions have selected the combined Yodlee/Andera solution for online account verification, opening and funding. READ MORE »

Payoneer has announced that it is helping direct selling industry leaders to pay their international sales representatives’ commissions on branded reloadable Prepaid MasterCard cards instead of sending them paper checks or wire transfers. READ MORE »

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