CardSpring announced a new Application Programming Interface (API) that lets developers add new capabilities to credit and debit cards by programming the CardSpring payment network to link online applications to specific payment events.

Because CardSpring runs in the payment network cloud, developers can add applications to any of the billions of existing credit or debit cards without changes to the purchase experience or store infrastructure, enabling any website or retailer to create innovative new online/offline commerce applications at a fraction of the cost and complexity of existing approaches.

The company also announced that it has raised a $10M Series A investment led by Accel Partners and Greylock Partners.

Discover has announced that Cashback Bonus rewards continued to trend upward in 2011, with the company "citing a 20% increase over 2010."

“Not only did cardmembers respond favorably to the extra Cashback Bonus that more than 70 top retailers offered during the holiday season, but they also appreciated the various enhancements we made throughout the year to ShopDiscover, such as adding merchant coupons and site functionality,” said Dana Traci, vice president of rewards and product management at Discover. “As for increased redemption, cardmembers clearly are seeing there’s great value in redeeming their Cashback Bonus, whether it be for partner gift cards, merchandise, statement credits or on Amazon.com.”

TrialPay has announced that it has raised more than $40 million in its latest round of funding.

“TrialPay’s approach to payments is different,” said Reid Hoffman, Partner at Greylock Partners. “Their tremendous growth in the last year validates the efficacy of the model. We believe that the next generation of e-commerce depends on the ability to maximize revenue from every transaction, and TrialPay is the only company that has successfully leveraged global advertiser relationships to meet that end.”

Visa was also an investor in this round of funding.

On the web:

• FTC to Review Mobile Payments Impact on U.S. Consumers - NFCNews
• Starbucks Says It's Number One in World in Mobile Payments - AuctionBytes
• Experiments in Virtual Currencies - MarketingVOX

On the wires:

• Simply Market Streamlines eInvoicing Through Ariba’s b-process
• Campus Apartments First to Offer Residents Ability to Pay Rent Through Facebook
• Live Gamer Partners with PaymentOne to Expand International Mobile Payment Options
• GE Capital Retail Bank Announces New Agreement to Provide Credit Card Program for Toys“R”Us
• iovation Stopped 50 Million Online Fraud Attempts in 2011, Biggest International Offender: Ghana
• Citi Launches First Account Analysis Tools for Credit Card Users on the iPad
• T-Mobile To Distribute Square Card Readers to Small Businesses
• Sabre Launches Travel Settlement Services Powered by Conferma
• CyberSource Announces Renewed Agreement With Facebook
• New Mercator Report on Next Generation EFT Networks