The Federal Reserve Board has announced that the Board of Governors has unanimously approved a 75-basis-point decrease in the discount rate to 1/2 percent. Also, the Federal Open Market Committee decided today to establish a target range for the federal funds rate of 0 to 1/4 percent.

In an article titled "Changing credit card terms squeeze consumers", Kathy Chu writes for USA Today about the obvious impacts that credit card rate increases by card issuers have on the financial life of those who have revolving balances on their credit cards. Chu writes that "credit cards, by encouraging a society of spenders rather than savers, have played a significant role in loading up consumers with unaffordable debt whose rates and terms can change at any time."

On his blog, Javelin's James Van Dyke writes about mobile banking and the current wait-and-see attitude evidenced by many mid-market and smaller banks, credit unions and card issuers. Van Dyke thinks that "very soon, you may not have a business that reaches vital consumer segments if your business isn’t available via mobile devices." [Editor's Note: Makes me wonder - who is the smallest US financial institution to have adopted mobile banking to date?]

Wells Fargo has announced it has increased its volume of electronic payments with other financial institutions by clearing checks through image exchange with Fiserv Solutions. READ MORE

We recently began making available the Payments News newsfeed on Twitter - more information here. Yesterday, Discover Card began following our feed - and we became aware of theirs as well. To follow, go to: http://twitter.com/discovercard and, if you're a Twitter member, you can click Follow to follow their feed. From the DiscoverCard tagline: "We are here to listen, help people spend smarter, manage debt better and save more so they can achieve a brighter financial future."

Does your financial services company also have a Twitter feed? If so, send us Feedback (link in menu bar above) and we'll announce it here as well. Better yet, just signup to follow PaymentsNews on Twitter! Are you a merchant? See what Amazon.com is doing with its AmazonDeals Twitter feed. So you can easily find them, we'll tag all posts here related to Twitter with the Twitter tag. READ MORE

Visa has announced that Visa cardholders in Taiwan and mainland China are the first Visa cardholders in the world to be able to use a new mobile phone-based one-time password to authenticate themselves when they use their Visa card for purchases over the internet.

Participating in the new Visa service are Chinatrust Commercial Bank and China Everbright Bank in China. The new service utilizes Verified by Visa, an online authentication tool that provides cardholders an increased level of protection when they shop online. READ MORE

Hourtown, a service we wrote about earlier this year that allows small businesses and service providers to have an automated online scheduling capability, has added the ability for service providers to have their clients pay online at the time of booking for their appointments.

According to Hourtown's Ryan Donahue, "local service professionals have historically lacked tools that enable them to really transact and sell their services online. Hourtown's new feature essentially enables an ecommerce storefront for a service professional's time." Hourtown's new feature is powered by PayPal.

The Smart Card Alliance Contactless and Mobile Payments Council has introduced new tools for merchants accepting or thinking about accepting contactless and mobile payments. Merchants can now access a model to calculate return on investment (ROI) for accepting contactless payments, as well as an online discussion forum to interact with and ask industry experts questions and post comments about contactless and mobile payments. READ MORE

Fifth Third Processing Solutions has announced a new partnership with eBillme to refer the payment alternative to its merchant processing customers.

Paymo, a mobile payments network that allows consumers anywhere in the world to buy online and pay with their mobile phone, has announced that its payments platform is now available in 39 markets around the world, allowing online merchants everywhere to sell to more than 3 billion mobile consumers worldwide. READ MORE

• SunTrust Introduces Health Savings Accounts for Employers Seeking to Take Control of Healthcare Costs
• VeriSign Survey Finds Nearly Ten Times As Many Consumers Feel Trust Is More Important Than Cost When Transacting Online
• Fiserv to Acquire i_Tech Corporation From First Interstate BancSystem
• AurionPro Services Provides Billing & Payment System Development for TrustedID
• Paymo Adds VISA Exec Jon Prideaux as Senior Advisor
• UATP Continues Expansion With Merchant Shenzhen Airlines
• Visa and SCORE Collaborate to Support Small Businesses
• PC World: Swedish Police Warn of Tampered Credit Card Terminals