The Merchants Payments Coalition has published a paper titled “Swipe Fee” Reform – International Lessons that takes a look at interchange fees (so-called "swipe fees" in the group's vernacular) in several markets outside the US. The paper states that "Compared to the rest of the world, U.S. swipe fees are: more than two times the rates in the UK and New Zealand, four times the rates in Australia, and over six times the cross border rates recently agreed upon by MasterCard and the EU."

Visa has released results of a new survey finding that "consumers believe retailers benefit far more from accepting credit and debit cards than they pay in costs." Visa said that the survey also found that consumers believe merchants see card cost acceptance as a part of doing business, much like paying for utilities such as electricity. READ MORE »

In an article titled "When Closing Accounts Is Counter-Revolutionary", Maria Aspan writes for the American Banker about RevolutionCard closing some of their cardholder accounts.

Discover Financial Services has reported financial results for its third quarter 2009. Discover reported that Discover Card sales volume declined 7% from the prior year to $23 billion but increased 6% from the prior quarter. Managed loans of $51 billion were relatively unchanged from the prior quarter. The third-quarter managed net charge-off rate rose to 8.39%, up 319 basis points and 60 basis points from the prior year and the prior quarter respectively.

Saying it is responding to "consumer demand for a card that offers the convenience of credit with simplified rates and terms," Bank of America has announced the BankAmericard Basic™ Visa card. "The new card features one basic rate for all types of transactions, including balance transfers and cash advances. That rate, which is tied to the U.S. Prime Rate, will not change over the life of the account." READ MORE »

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