Here's a review of this week's top stories on Payments News. If you missed it, last week's Weekly Wrap is here. Back to the future!: for fun, click for this same week's activity a year ago here on Payments News!

Looking for more payments reading? Checkout our Other Payments and Banking Blogs page for more from the blogosphere about the worlds of payments and banking.

Quote of the week:: From TranSys, the operator of London's Oyster Card system: "The technical problem which affected Oyster readers at London Underground stations has now been resolved and all stations are all fully functional. The problem affected pay as you go users only. Steps are being taken to ensure that this does not happen again and we will undertake a full root cause analysis. TranSys regrets any inconvenience caused to Transport for London’s customers."

• American Express News
  • American Express introduced Text MYAMEX - a new mobile service that allows American Express cardholders to learn their account balance on the run. (See more American Express and Mobile Banking news.)
  • American Express reported second quarter 2008 financial results - with revenue up 8% but income from continuing operations down 37% vs. the same period last year. Amex revised downward its prior forecast of 4-6% earnings growth - saying "that outlook was based on business and economic conditions in line with, or moderately worse than, January 2008. The environment has weakened significantly since then, particularly during the month of June." (See more American Express news.)
• Bill Payment News
  • Yodlee announced that Yodlee PayToday – Yodlee’s expedited payments solution – is now available as a revenue generating addition to any financial institution’s online banking website. (See more BIll Payment, Expedited Payments and Yodlee news.)
• Contactless Payments News
  • ANZ and Visa announced the launch of the first reloadable, prepaid contactless card in Australia. (See more Australia, Contactless Payments and Visa news.)
• MasterCard News
  • MasterCard Worldwide announced the integration of its MasterCard Payment Gateway with iPayables’ electronic invoice delivery capabilities to provide expanded payment solutions to corporations and financial institutions. (See more Commercial Payments and MasterCard news.)
• Mobile Banking News
  • Forrester published a new report titled "Consumers Are Apathetic About Mobile Banking" concluding that "online bankers and bill payers are uninterested in the mobile banking pitch." (See more Mobile Banking and Online Banking news.)
  • Mobile Money Ventures, the San Francisco-based joint venture of Citi and SK Telecom, announced its first customer implementation with Citibank Hong Kong. According to MMV, Citibank will use the its mobile platform to deliver mobile financial services to its customers in Hong Kong. (See more Mobile Banking and Mobile Money Ventures news.)
• Mobile Payments News
  • The Reserve Bank of India asked banks "to keep their mobile payment services on hold till it issues final guidelines for such transactions." (See more India and Mobile Payments news.)
• NACHA News
  • Glenbrook’s Carol Coye Benson interviewed Steve Ellis, NACHA Chairman, recently about the use of ACH to access consumer checking accounts and NACHA's Secure Vault Payments initiative. (See more NACHA and Secure Vault Payments News.)
• Online Banking News
  • APACS, the UK payments association, released figures showing that the number of adults using online banking in the UK has increased by 505% in the past seven years from less than 3.5 million in 2000 to just over 21 million last year. (See more APACS, Online Banking and UK news.)
• PayPal News
• PayPal named Darrell MacMullin to the role of country manager of PayPal Canada. (See more Ecommerce Payments and PayPal news.)

• Open Job Listings on PaymentsJobs.com
  
  • Sr. Marketing Capabilities Manager - Mobile at Alliance Data (Columbus, OH)
  • E-Commerce Analyst at First Midwest Bank (Itasca, IL)
  • Senior Manager, Product Development at American Express (New York, NY)
  • Compliance Manager - Mountain View at Google, Inc. (Mountain View, California)
• Upcoming Glenbrook Payments Education Offerings
  
  • Glenbrook's Russ Jones will presenting at this year's Direct Response Forum (DRF) on August 12th on the subject of "What We're Watching in Emerging Payments". Russ will also be participating in a round table discussion on best practices in recurring payments on August 13th.
  • Glenbrook Payments Boot Camp - Santa Clara, California - October 15-16
  • Glenbrook Payments Boot Camp - Denver - December 3-4

You can find all of our Weekly Wrap summaries in the Payments News Weekly Wrap Archive. They're published every Saturday and look back at the highlights of the week's news. Please share on how we can improve the Weekly Wrap!

CGAP (Consultative Group to Assist the Poor) and the IFC (International Finance Corporation) at the World Bank has published a new white paper titled "Developing Mobile Money Ecosystems" by Beth Jenkins. "This report draws heavily on the experience of participants in the inaugural GSMA Mobile Money Summit, co-sponsored by IFC, CGAP, and the UK Department for International Development, held May 14-15, 2008, in Cairo, Egypt."

Jenkins writes: "As mobile money ecosystems develop, all of their members – network operators, banks, utilities, and other firms of all kinds, as well as international financial institutions, development donors, and civil society organizations – must also keep the perspective of the customer, and especially the low-income customer, in mind."

Tony Adams writes for the Columbus, Georgia Ledger-Enquirer about TSYS - asking "can TSYS grow?"