Kristin Roberts reports for Reuters that Wal-Mart has offered to modify its pending application with the FDIC for a limited purpose bank.

Earlier today, Citibank launched Citibank Direct, a new high yield savings account product.

One of our partners just opened the new Citibank e-savings account -- an interesting and rather positive experience. Read on for details.   » Continue Reading

Stored Value Systems has announced the results of a national web survey of adults conducted at the end of February revealed that eight in 10 said they would rather receive a gift card to their favorite retailer than any other kind of gift.   » Continue Reading

I4 Commerce, the company offering the Bill Me Later payment service, has announced it has secured $27.4 million in venture funding led by Kingdon Capital Management and including previous major investors, Crosspoint Venture Partners, Azure Capital Partners and GRP Partners.   » Continue Reading

Clint Riley reports for the Wall St. Journal on Citibank's launch of a new high yield savings account program competitive with similar accounts offered by ING Direct, HSBC, and Emigrant Savings. Citi's approach, however, also requires consumers to maintain a Citibank checking account. The new e-Savings account is offered on a new website at direct.citibank.com.   » Continue Reading

The Gulf Marketing Review interviews John Stuart, MasterCard's senior vice president for global sponsorships.   » Continue Reading

CardRatings.com is urging consumers burdened with high levels of credit card debt to consider using a technique often suggested with mortgages - make payments twice as often and you'll significantly affect the total amount of interest you pay for a given amount of debt.   » Continue Reading

NACHA has announced Authentication Mandate: Compliance Issues & Revenue Opportunities for Online Banking, a conference focusing on the business opportunities resulting from financial institutions' online authentication capabilities and the recent Federal regulatory guidance on authentication in Internet banking.   » Continue Reading

Matthew Charles reports for Australia's Herald Sun on the new Altitude Platinum rewards card program launched by Westpac that actually issues each consumer two cards - a co-branded American Express card and a Westpac MasterCard.   » Continue Reading

The Federal Reserve Bank of New York has published a staff paper titled “The Topology of Interbank Payment Flows,” (PDF) by Kimmo Soramäki, Morten L. Bech, Jeffrey Arnold, Robert J. Glass, and Walter E. Beyeler.   » Continue Reading

Michael Jivkov writes for the UK's Independent about yesterday's financial results reported by Neteller and asks the question "is there no end in sight to the company's growth?"   » Continue Reading

Andrea Coombes reports for MarketWatch on the ABA's report yesterday that the percentage of credit-card accounts that were 30 days or more delinquent fell to 4.27% in the fourth quarter, from 4.74% in the third quarter and down from a record high of 4.81% in the second quarter of 2005.   » Continue Reading

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