In a press release today, the European Commission said it "can confirm that it has sent a Statement of Objections (SO) to Visa on 3rd April 2009. The Commission's preliminary view is that the multilateral interchange fees (MIFs) set directly by Visa restrict competition between banks for accepting consumer payment cards without benefiting consumers by contributing to technical and economic progress."

The Network Branded Prepaid Card Association (NBPCA) and the Center for Financial Services Innovation have partnered to release what they are calling "the first large, in-depth survey of underbanked consumers currently using reloadable prepaid cards. It found that 96 percent of users said the cards were useful and 94 percent would recommend a reloadable prepaid card to someone else." READ MORE »

J.P. Morgan's Treasury Services business has announced it has been ranked by NACHA - The Electronic Payments Association as the top financial institution in total automated clearing house (ACH) network transactions originated for 2008. According to the bank, it has "led the industry in ACH originations for a record 34 years in a row, since the inception of the network. J.P. Morgan originated more than 3.5 billion ACH transactions last year." READ MORE »

PayPal and The Royal Bank of Scotland have won the ‘Best New Prepaid Card Product of the Year’ at Card Awards 2009 for their PayPal Top Up product, which is processed by global payments services provider, TSYS. READ MORE »

As mentioned earlier by Reuters, Revolution Money has announced it has received $42 million in Series C funding from a Goldman Sachs affiliate (a new investor), as well as AOL co-founder Case, Revolution Money Chairman Ted Leonsis, former Charles Schwab CEO David Pottruck, former JP Morgan Vice Chairman David Golden, Citigroup Inc. and Morgan Stanley. Here's a link to the official press release from the company. READ MORE »

In an editorial in today's edition, the New York Times argues that Senator Chris Dodds should press on to pass his pending legislation that would accelerate and strengthen changes to the practices of credit card issuers that were originally issued last December for mid-2010 adoption by the Federal Reserve. The editorial concludes: "The Federal Reserve regulations are useful, but consumers should not have to wait for real help until 2010."

NACHA has published its lists of the top 50 ACH originators and receivers for 2008. The origination side is very concentrated with the top 10 originating financial institutions accounting for 73.3 percent of all interbank ACH payments in 2008, up slightly from 72.5 percent in 2007. For the receiving side, most closely representing the distribution of financial institutions deposit accounts across the industry, the top ten receiving institutions accounted for 39.4 percent of all interbank ACH payments in 2008, up slightly from 38.3 percent in 2007.

NYCE has announced that it will offer balance inquiries by text message to its financial institution participants as a standard feature of full participation in the NYCE Network. The service will be powered by Monitise Americas. READ MORE »

The number of ACH payments in 2008 topped 18.2 billion, representing an increase of 1.2 billion over 2007, according to statistics released today by NACHA – The Electronic Payments Association at its PAYMENTS 2009 conference. The dollar value of consumer ACH payments made via the Internet is nearing $1 trillion annually ($939 billion in 2008). READ MORE »

This week, NACHA's Payments 2009 Conference is being held in Orlando. Our Glenbrook colleagues Erin McCune and Bryan Derman are attending the conference and will be sharing some of their learnings and reactions over on Glenbrook's PaymentsViews.com. Erin kicks off the coverage with an update on the latest B2B payments stats - and she'll also be tweeting her observations from her Twitter account (@erinmccune) using the hashtag #pay09. Bryan's on Twitter too: @bdermanct. If you'd like to meet with Erin or Bryan in Orlando this week, drop them an email!

Reuters reports this morning that Revolution Money has raised an additional $42 million in financing from a group that includes a Goldman Sachs affiliate and participation from earlier investors Citigroup and Morgan Stanley. Revolution's Steve Case will be speaking this week at NACHA's Payments 2009 Conference in Orlando. See also the WSJ.com Digits blog: Payment Processor Revolution Money Pumped With $42M.

MasterCard Worldwide has announced the appointment of Vicky S. Bindra, 44, as president, Asia/Pacific Middle East Africa region. Mr. Bindra, who will join MasterCard on June 1, 2009, replaces Andre Sekulic, 58, who is retiring. READ MORE »

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