Sam Hodges writes for the Dallas Morning News about how payment cards are displacing cash and checks at churches and charities.

Glen Fest writes for Bank Technology News about ACH fraud and new proposals under consideration that "would also require originators to maintain statistics on their return activity and rid themselves of problem firms (read: telemarketers) that blatantly violate NACHA rules with improper Web- or telephone-based authorizations-each helping to form the basis of a de facto originators blacklist."

Glen Fest writes for Bank Technology News about mobile banking - saying that "recruiting Gen Y users will be most banks' priority. Ninety percent of the under-25 set already have data capabilities on their phones. And more than half of younger users say they will consider mobile banking offerings when choosing a bank."

Aite Group has published a new report titled "Top Trends in U.S. Corporate Cash Management: Strategies for a New Environment" that "explores the top trends that are currently shaping the U.S. cash management space and the strategies that are being implemented by the largest global players, down to the smallest community banks."   » Continue Reading

Aneace Haddad of Welcome Real-time shares his London contactless conference presentation - taking a skeptical view of contactless payments that simply replace mag stripe functionality and suggesting that the real value is to also enable the card to interact with the merchant's POS to enable promotional marketing in addition to basic purchase functionality.

In an article titled 'Discover Finds a Fan Base Ahead of Looming Spinoff", Robin Sidel writes for the Wall St. Journal about the spinoff of Discover Financial Services from parent Morgan Stanley. The spinoff is to be completed next Monday when Discover is expected to have a market capitalization of about $14 billion.

In a post titled "Google Checkout Team Lays out Differences From eBay's PayPal", Red Herring blogger Tomio Geron writes about a presentation by Google's Michael Feldman comparing Google Checkout to PayPal. Feldman said that as compared to PayPal as a payment method at completion of a purchase, Google "Checkout provides solutions much earlier in the shopping cycle. We help consumers find merchants … and can help them through that experience. We help influence users much earlier in the process and streamline the actual process."

• Neteller founder pleads guilty in online gambling case in New York
• MasterCard Teams With Cybertrust to Help Merchants Achieve PCI Data Security Standard Compliance
• Inside Contactless Recognised for Excellence in Innovation in Contactless Technologies

Last week, in testimony before the US House Financial Services Committee, Sandra Braunstein, Director, Division of Consumer and Community Affairs of The Federal Reserve Board, provided a deep look at consumer credit reports in the US. The Committee was looking into issues associated with errors in credit reports and how consumers can get the errors corrected.

The new issue of The Visa Quarterly is mostly devoted to mobile payments - including an interview with Dave Wentker, vice president of Mobile Innovation at Visa International, and a discussion of Visa's Mobile Platform. Payments News took a look at Visa's Mobile Platform earlier this year.

Mercator Advisory Group has released a new report titled "HSA Growth Accelerates In Uncharted Waters" that discusses the significant investments being made to implement Prepaid HSA cards that will provide significant benefits to cardholders and Third Party Administrators.   » Continue Reading

Visa USA says that a Federal Reserve Board decision announced earlier today will "make it easier for merchants to accept cards at vending machines, parking lots and a range of other locations, giving consumers more places to make convenient, small ticket purchases with their Visa cards."   » Continue Reading

AccountNow, a marketer of MasterCard and Visa branded prepaid cards, has announced the closing of $12.75 million in a third round of venture funding led by Trident Capital.   » Continue Reading

TowerGroup has announced a new report titled "Price Optimization: A Practical Guide to a Retail Bank Implementation" that finds that the "strategies and procedures used by most banks today to set prices remain too simplistic. Banks are still relying heavily on manual processes and so are prone to errors, and they often exclude consideration of a critical factor -- the consumer's price elasticity of demand."   » Continue Reading

mFoundry has announced the expansion of its Spotlight Financial Platform to enable mobile banking applications on the iPhone.   » Continue Reading

Northwest Airlines has announced that it is now offering PayPal as a way to pay for tickets at its Web site www.nwa.com. "With more than 140 million accounts, PayPal is a global leader in online payment solutions that allows a safe, easy way to pay for items and services online. With PayPal, Northwest customers now have a new way to pay for tickets using debit cards, bank accounts, stored balances, or credit cards through their individual PayPal accounts."   » Continue Reading

The Federal Reserve Board has announced its approval of a final rule to create an exception for transactions of $15 or less from Regulation E's requirement that receipts be made available to consumers for transactions initiated at an electronic terminal. According to the Fed, the rule is intended to facilitate the ability of consumers to use debit cards in retail environments where making receipts available may not be practical or cost effective. A copy of the Federal Register notice (PDF) is available online.

Visa USA has released a "detailed analysis revealing key insights into how U.S. businesses large and small are spending their money. The Visa Commercial Consumption Expenditure™ (CCE) Index for 2006 analyzes government data sources and research methods to provide a useful assessment of business expenditures."   » Continue Reading

Visa International and FIFA (Fédération Internationale de Football Association) have announced confirmation that "Visa has become a FIFA Partner with global rights to a broad range of FIFA activities, including the 2010 and 2014 FIFA World Cups and the FIFA Women's World Cups." According to an article by Robin Sidel in the Wall St. Journal, Visa will be paying $170 million for the sponsorship.   » Continue Reading

Paul F. Roberts writes for InfoWorld about a conference held last month by the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston exploring various aspects of contactless payment technology including security.

• TransUnion Enhances Its Credit Retriever Solution
• Alliance Data Signs Multi-Year Expansion And Renewal Agreement With Fortunoff
• Tips for the First Time Credit Users: MMI provides financial advice for college students
• American Airlines and MasterCard Introduce the 'Sum It Up Sweepstakes'
• Capital One Announces Cost Restructuring Initiative
• Alliance Data Signs Multi-Year Expansion And Renewal Agreement With Fortunoff
• Givex and Merchant Link Complete Gift Card Program Integration
• New York Times: Wells Fargo Gives Next Chief an Early Start
• Javelin Predicts Contactless Cards and In-Store Mobile Payments Initiatives Will Languish Until Chips Are Embedded in Mobile Devices
• The Institute of Fraud Risk Management Offers Professional Training to Combat Identity Theft
• GE Money Bank in Germany selects Atos Origin as its Visa Card processor
• FundsXpress and The First National Bank of Bastrop Announce Multi-Year Renewal of Business Partnership
• VeriFone’s PAYware Selected For Hong Kong’s First Ever Gift Card Scheme

China UnionPay Data (CUP Data) and Arcot Systems have announced a partnership that the two companies say will help minimize Internet transaction fraud. Under the licensing and development agreement, CUP Data will use Arcot’s TransFort family of solutions in the joint development of a common risk management outsourcing service for marketing to card issuers in China.   » Continue Reading

Fidelity National Information Services and EFD/eFunds have announced that they have entered into a definitive agreement whereby FIS will acquire EFD in an all-cash transaction valued at approximately $1.8 billion.   » Continue Reading

Aneace Haddad of Welcome Real-Time blogs about a recent Gartner report titled "Banks' Retail Payment Operations at a Tipping Point" saying that he found it so interesting that he "obtained the right for you to view it." Aneace cites a couple of comments from the report suggesting what bankers should do including "Introduce PIVAS [Payment Information Value-Added Services] to reduce pricing pressure from merchants and initiate a virtuous circle for retail payment operations. Merchants must actively support card programs and emerging payment solutions, but they are challenging the pricing model for the interchange. It's time to introduce services such as PIVAS to convince them of the real value of bank-sponsored retail payment networks.”

The Age reports from Melbourne that "the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) is currently considering reducing to zero the fees banks charge to process transactions made using other banks' cards, also known as interchange fees."

Philip Lowe, Assistant Governor (Financial System) of the Reserve Bank of Australia, spoke earlier today on the topic of "Reform of Australia's Payments System: The 2007/08 Review" at the 4th International Consumer Credit Card Summit being held in Sydney, Australia. In his speech, he noted that "merchants’ acceptance decisions and their ability to influence how payments are made by their customers can potentially play an important role in influencing the competitive dynamics in the payment systems."

Wells Fargo's Board of Directors has named John G. Stumpf, President and Chief Operating Officer, to be the Company's Chief Executive Officer effective immediately. Stumpf, who retains the title of President, succeeds Dick Kovacevich, who continues as Chairman.   » Continue Reading

Wells Fargo and Visa USA have announced the launch of an "extensive mobile pilot to test consumer mobile payments and services. The pilot has three phases to help Wells Fargo and Visa better understand how consumers will use mobile payment and service options on mobile devices equipped with Near Field Communication (NFC) technology."   » Continue Reading

APACS, the UK payments association, and ABTA, the UK travel association, have published a consumer advice guide - Payments Abroad (PDF) - providing UK consumers advice on how to make their trip overseas safer and easier.   » Continue Reading

JCB has announced the appointment of Tamio Takakura as President and Chief Executive Officer (CEO), effective immediately. Mr. Takakura succeeds Hiroya Nobuhara who had served as JCB's President and CEO for the past 4 years.   » Continue Reading

• AuctionBytes.com: eBay Testing New Design of PayPal Home Page
• SearchSecurity.com: Are PCI auditors pitching products?
• JPMorgan Chase and Syracuse University Partner to Create Innovative Financial Services Technology and Infrastructure Programs
• Atmel's Secure Microcontrollers Qualified for Korean Banking Industry
• VeriFone’s MX870 Fully Integrated to IBM’s SurePOS ACE
• Financial Times: I-flex puts its faith in Oracle
• Card Technology: London Contactless Launch Targets Small Merchants

We have received news of the following recent management changes:

• Ronald G. Mazursky has been named Managing Director at Novantas, a customer science and revenue strategy provider. Mazursky was formerly a Director at Edgar, Dunn & Co.

The UK's OFT has announced a new work effort with the UK credit card industry and consumer bodies to "make the cost of credit cards easier for consumers to understand."   » Continue Reading

Visa announced today that Hans Morris has been appointed President of Visa Inc., effective September 1, 2007.   » Continue Reading

Visa USA has announced that John Philip Coghlan, President and Chief Executive Officer, has resigned. According to Visa, "Coghlan led the U.S. region of Visa since July 2005. During that time he oversaw efforts to prepare Visa USA for its restructuring, undertaking a series of initiatives to enhance Visa's financial performance and reporting. John Partridge, President of Inovant LLC, will assume the expanded responsibilities of interim President of Visa USA."

Celent has announced a new Healthcare Banking research service and an inaugural report titled "Healthcare Transactions: What’s in the Forecast for Financial Institutions". The report addresses the complexities of healthcare transaction processing as well as the opportunities the market presents to financial institutions.   » Continue Reading

A global study of banking, retail and payment services executives' attitudes towards the burgeoning Chinese payments market conducted by the Economist Intelligence Unit on behalf of First Data International has revealed that the vast majority of respondents are optimistic about the prospects for electronic payments in China. Eighty-five percent of respondents, for example, believe the prospects for credit cards are either highly or somewhat promising. While bankers recognize the considerable challenges, they are bullish about the opportunities and are committed to this rapidly growing market.   » Continue Reading

Bloomberg reports that Experian has agreed to buy a majority stake in Brazil's Serasa, that country's largest credit bureau.

Experian has announced a new fraud detection solution that the company says "integrates data authentication with consumer challenge questions to create the most comprehensive approach for detecting fraud and managing the associated risk. The new product, Knowledge IQSM, is the first system to merge two essential elements in the fight against fraud."   » Continue Reading

Dave Birch writes about the 40th anniversary of the ATM - noting that "John Shepherd-Baron, the former De La Rue executive credited with inventing that machine in 1967, now believes that the ubiquitous ATM will be made redundant within the next three to five years by the demise of paper cash." Birch concludes saying "I am now fascinated to determine the genesis of the modern ATM. Any -- and I mean any -- relevant details would be gratefully received."

The International Herald Tribune has published an AP story about PayPal's La Vista, Nebraska, operations center - noting that "more than 2,000 of PayPal's nearly 7,000 employees worldwide work at the company's La Vista complex providing customer support, fraud protection and resolving customer problems in more than a dozen languages."

Tyfone has announced the launch of Harmony - a middleware communications gateway that Tyfone says "enables secure, two-way bank-to-mobile-phone interactions, and Over-the-Air (OTA) customization for mobile banking, mobile payments – including card account customization – and on-demand merchant relationship services."   » Continue Reading

In an article titled 'Credit Bureaus Fight Consumer-Ordered Freezes", Byron Acohido and Jon Swartz write for USA Today about the Consumer Data Industry Association and its efforts on behalf of the three major credit bureaus (Experian, Equifax and TransUnion) to slow legislative efforts at the state level regarding laws that enable consumers to freeze access to their credit histories. They write that "by far the best protection against new-account fraud is a credit freeze, say credit consultants and fraud investigators. A credit freeze bars the credit bureaus from issuing your credit report — the summary of loans and payments that forms the basis of your credit score."

• Cardtronics Announces ATM Branding Deal With ING DIRECT
• TriCipher Secures Online Financial Transactions
• Federal Reserve Banks Announce Changes To Increase Check Service Efficiency
• Washington Post: In China, Cash Carries the Weight
• TSYS and Norwich Union Launch Rewards Card Programme
• eGistics Names George F. Thomas to Board of Directors
• Ping Identity Announces SignOn.com
• Credit Cards: Get You In, Keep You In, Keep You Spending
• The skinny on checks: Where do they end up?
• Securing Communications with SSL/TLS: A High-Level Overview
• Mobile Ticketing in the UK: Paperless Tickets Hit The Right Note At 2000 Trees Music Festival
• Citi Launches an Exclusive Credit Card, New Citi Chairman American Express Card, to Smith Barney and Citi Private Bank Clients

Mercator Advisory Group has published a new report titled "Purchasing Cards, Integrated Procurement Solutions, and the Commercial Card Market" that "examines new levels of sophistication in the domestic commercial credit space with respect to purchasing card programs, and supporting solutions such as Electronic Invoice Presentation and Payment (EIPP).   » Continue Reading

The American Bankers Association and America’s Community Bankers have announced that their respective boards have approved pursuing a merger with the intention of finalizing it during the fourth quarter of 2007. The new organization will retain the American Bankers Association name. Ed Yingling would remain in his current role as President and CEO of the ABA. Diane Casey-Landry, currently President and CEO of ACB, would become Executive Vice President and COO of the combined entity.   » Continue Reading

Our thanks to Jim Bruene (of NetBanker and the Online Banking Report) for listing Payments News among his top five banking industry blogs! We also enjoy all of the other banking (and related) blogs he's listed and highly recommend them as well.

McDonald's Restaurants of Canada has announced that it will begin installing "MasterCard's PayPass readers and chip card terminals in some of its 1,400 restaurants across Canada as early as 2008."   » Continue Reading

Microsoft has announced it is joining with MasterCard Worldwide, FedEx Corporate Services and Bank of America Corp. to provide a comprehensive tool for entrepreneurs to start and grow their businesses. Microsoft said that enhancements will be made to financial management, payroll solutions and shipping to Microsoft Startup Center, a free online guide that provides step-by-step advice and resources that small-business owners need when they start their business.   » Continue Reading

Dove Consulting's latest newsletter has an article titled "Open Loop Prepaid: The Jury Is Still Out" by Chris Allen, Senior Manager. In the article, Allen says "despite all the rosy growth projections, the jury is still out on open loop prepaid and a winning strategy has yet to emerge on either the issuer or processor side."

The Direct Response Forum has announced that the 2007 Forum has been approved for up to 13 Certified Treasury Professional/Certified Cash Manager recertification credits by the Association for Financial Professionals. This year’s DRF annual meeting will be held in Seattle from August 5th through 7th.   » Continue Reading

Regions Financial Corp. and Visa USA have announced a long-term partnership agreement whereby "Regions will continue to offer all Visa consumer debit products to its customers, including Visa check card, Interlink and Plus. In an extension to the previous partnership agreement, Regions will switch all its processing services to Visa USA for all Visa check card, Interlink and Plus transactions. Regions currently issues Visa credit card products and will continue to do so under a separate agreement."   » Continue Reading

Rick Biggs writes for Bankstocks.com about the upcoming spin-out of Discover Financial Services from parent Morgan Stanley and does some quick analysis regarding how it might be valued.

• OASIS Members Form Committee to Standardize Symmetric Encryption Key Management Across the Enterprise
• Equifax Helps Businesses Thwart Authorized User Deception
• Cyber Criminals Rely On Mind Games To Scam Internet Users
• The Hartford Offers Valuable New Web Class on eSecurity for Businesses
• Survey Results Reveal an Increase in Contactless Payments via New MasterCard Mobile with PayPass
• Datacard Group Announces Relationship with Aconite
• The Golden 1 Credit Union Deploys Arcot Multi-Factor Authentication to Enhance Online Banking Security
• TransUnion Adds Insurance Verification to Its Healthcare Revenue Cycle Platform
• TransUnion Expands Role in India With Strategic Hire
• FINO Adopts Gemalto Smartcards To Accelerate Microbanking Deployment In India
• Experian's Eiger Systems expands into Italian market

Kimberly Palmer writes for US News & World Report about credit card rewards programs - saying that "while many people enjoy their rewards, what they often don't realize is that they're paying for them, in the form of higher interest payments, annual fees, and what economists dub 'purchase acceleration'."

Earlier this month, MasterCard announced that Federal Judge Barbara S Jones had ruled that Visa's Settlement Service Fee ("SSF") was unlawful and must be repealed. Judge Jones' decision in this case (PDF) has recently been posted to the web site of the US District Court for the Southern District of New York.

Cornerstone Advisors' Terence Roche writes for Gonzobanker about the new raid on retail bank revenues coming from the likes of Capital One with its new "Capital One decoupled debit card" product and HSBC/Tempo's new CVS-branded debit card. Earlier this week, we noticed that Sheetz has begun working with Capital One on its new debit card program.

Both of these innovative debit card products ride the ACH rails into the consumer's bank checking account - there's no need for the consumer to switch banks - rewarding the cardholder in the process with a much richer rewards program stimulating higher usage and frequency on the new entrants' cards vs. the bank's own traditional (and most likely unrewarded) debit card. Meanwhile, the retail banker is left with the costs of servicing the ACH-based payment and earns no revenue on the transaction itself.

A time for concern? Seems to us that retail bank payments strategists may want to be updating their board presentations! Read Roche's article and decide for your self!

InComm has announced that the Mio Money Prepaid MasterCard and the Mio Now Card issued by BankFirst are now available to consumers with no monthly fees attached. When the card is used, consumers pay a fee - but there is no longer a monthly fee.   » Continue Reading

Mike Weiss reports for the San Francisco Chronicle an amazing story of how an identity theft victim came across the thief who had stolen her identity while having coffee at Starbucks and then chased her until she was captured by the police, tried and convicted. The victim, Karen Lodrick, a design consultant, has written about her experience on her personal blog, www.FightingBackNow.com.

In an article titled 'How to Cash In On 0% Offers For Credit Cards", Jane Kim writes for the Wall St. Journal about how some folks are taking advantage of those 0% interest solicitations from card issuers and using them to fund investments in high yield savings accounts - with one individual reporting he makes about $1,300 to $1,400 a year with this strategy. Kim says the strategy has been nicknamed "app-o-rama" on personal-finance Web sites where it's regularly discussed. She also points out that, for the strategy to work, you have to pay attention to the details - just one late payment could destroy the interest-free status on the account, for example.

David Wighton writes for the Financial Times about how Visa Inc. is approaching its potential litigation liability associated with various law suits pending against various Visa entities. He writes that Visa "plans to set up a litigation fund to protect investors in its forthcoming initial public offering from legal claims. Under the plan, Visa’s US member banks will take on responsibility for the outstanding legal actions and will contribute billions of dollars from their flotation proceeds to an escrow account to pay claims."

Gift cards go local - Ilana DeBare writes for the San Francisco Chronicle about how local merchants are now also selling gift cards. DeBare writes that "a small but growing number of neighborhood stores are starting to sell their own branded gift cards, spurred by advances in point-of-sale technology that make it relatively cheap and easy for them to process the cards."

• Police find missing gift card machine
• Google, eBay kiss, make up -- sort of
• India: Mobile banking is the future
• Changes for Debit Card Holds

We periodically take a look at who's subscribing to the email distribution of Payments News. It's always interesting to see which companies are "tuning in" to our service.

So, if you're curious, here's our current top 10 list of subscribing companies: American Express, PayPal, MasterCard, Capital One, Chase Paymentech, First Data Corp., Bank of America, Wells Fargo, Discover, and Intuit.

This is hardly scientific - as many of our readers use the Payments News RSS feed to view our headlines in their RSS reader (rather than requesting a daily email subscription) and many more opt to just bookmark PaymentsNews.com (or make PN their home page!) and visit us first thing in the morning and throughout the day using their web browser.

Blackberry and Treo users can also view a mobile edition of Payments News whenever they want by bookmarking our Payments News "River of News" newsfeed.

Hope you have a great weekend!

ViVOtech and mFoundry have announced they will be working together to "provide mobile financial services to wireless customers. mFoundry’s and ViVOtech’s technologies, when combined, give consumers a simple new way to use their mobile phone for contactless payments, banking and commerce."   » Continue Reading

Visa Inc. has filed its initial Visa Inc. S-4 Registration Statement with the SEC related to the series of transactions for the planned combination of Visa Canada, Visa International and Visa USA into a single private stock company, Visa Inc. Visa Europe will remain a membership association and will become a licensee of, and own a minority interest in, Visa Inc. A number of supporting documents and exhibits were also included.

In it's press release announcing the filing, Visa said that "once the SEC has completed its review and declared the registration statement effective, Visa will undertake a global process to secure member approval of the restructuring."

Robert L. Mitchell writes for Computerworld about contactless payments - saying "there's just one problem: Only a tiny percentage of consumers have contactless cards today, and most retailers remain on the sidelines." He goes on: "what ultimately may drive acceptance of contactless technology with users, and ultimately merchants, is its integration with mobile phones."

West Texas National Bank has announced that it has adopted Pay By Touch's biometric check cashing service. Paycheck Secure powered by Pay By Touch lets consumers use a finger scan to quickly and securely identify themselves to cash a government or payroll check.   » Continue Reading

Jim Bruene posts on his new Mobile Money & Banking blog about his experience earlier this week at the Mobile Commerce Summit. Jim says "the most interesting part for me was hearing the results of the BancorpSouth pilot with AT&T, Firethorn, and CheckFree." Read his post for the details.

Mercator Advisory Group has announced a new report titled "Online and Mobile Digital Content Markets" that it says "frames the challenges and opportunities posed by digital content across multiple distribution channels and as advertising or paid content."   » Continue Reading

As anticipated earlier in a Wall St. Journal story, Danal, Inc., the US subsidiary of South Korea-based Danal Ltd. has announced that it has received $9.5 million in venture financing led by Morgenthaler Ventures with participation from the Korean parent company as well.   » Continue Reading

QSR Magazine is reporting that Sheetz has begun "testing an innovative new program that provides debit card customers with rewards similar to those available to credit customers — The Sheetz Debitz MasterCard" with Capital One. Rewards are available on purchases at both Sheetz as well as anywhere else MasterCard is accepted. This is the first merchant using Capital One's recently announced "Decoupled Debit" product that we've come across.

Obopay has announced the addition of several new mobile merchants and application providers to its Mobile Merchant Platform - including" innovative wireless community and media services provider Xringer Inc., mobile recycling program RIPMobile, online marketplace provider Chegg.com, mobile gaming platform developer Exit Games, and mobile search and advertising firm 4INFO."   » Continue Reading

MasterCard Worldwide and FIFA have announced that they "have reached agreement resolving the contract dispute related to MasterCard’s first right to acquire the sponsorship for the 2010 & 2014 FIFA World Cups. As a result of the agreement, MasterCard will discontinue its sponsorship of the 2010 & 2014 FIFA World Cups, with FIFA agreeing to compensate MasterCard for that discontinuation. Both parties also agreed to terminate legal proceedings in the U.S. and Switzerland. With this settlement, MasterCard and FIFA have found a mutually agreeable resolution of this dispute." Bloomberg is reporting that MasterCard was paid $90 million by FIFA as part of the settlement.

American Express has introduced new Membership Rewards program levels that the company says are "aligned with specific Card products designed to better meet Cardmember lifestyle and reward program usage needs."   » Continue Reading

According to a new survey commissioned by Visa, 82 percent of respondents agree that Quick Service Restaurant purchases made with debit or credit cards are more convenient than dealing with cash. And 68 percent say using payment cards is faster than paying with cash.   » Continue Reading

The Healthcare Solutions business of JPMorgan Chase and RelayHealth, the connectivity services company of McKesson Corporation, have announced a strategic relationship to offer an integrated set of claim and payment processing solutions. The two companies say "this relationship will transform the way that insurers, healthcare providers and consumers interact to settle claim payments, moving to a fully electronic model."   » Continue Reading

Rebecca Buckman writes for the Wall St. Journal about Danal Co., a Korean company about to enter the US offering mobile payments. She says Danal "is targeted at young people, some of whom don't have credit cards and want a quick, easy way to pay for low-cost digital goods." The US subsidiary is expected to be financially backed by Morgenthaler Ventures, according to Buckman.

We ran a Facebook poll last night asking those between 18 and 24 years of age "When you buy something online, how do you prefer to pay?" Here are the results - based upon a sample of over 400 responses - hardly scientific but interesting nonetheless:

No surprise, the debit card is most favored among this age group - but PayPal's showing is also especially strong. New entrant Google Checkout barely moves the needle in this particular survey and almost no one likes to pay by providing their checking account details (also known as eCheck).

According to the latest Experian study on the subprime lending market, subprime consumers -- those with an Experian credit score of 620 or lower -- are more likely to be 30 days or more late on their mortgage payments than on their unsecured bankcard obligations. As consumers have historically paid mortgage debt over bankcard debt, this finding represents a significant departure from conventional behavior.   » Continue Reading

• Financial Times: Pay By Touch Puts Its Finger on Loyalty
• CUP Data to Provide Credit Card Processing Services for Huaxia Bank
• mPoria Inc. Teams with PayPal to Offer Fast, Secure Mobile Shopping for Consumers Nationwide
• NCR Study Shows Consumers Are Driving Self-Service
• Wesabe's CEO Plays Cards Close to the Vest
• Alliance Data's Loyalty Business Signs Multi-Year Renewal With Leading Grocer A&P Canada
• ZKA and Visa sign debit card co-operation deal
• First Data International Announces Launch Of Vue Cinema Gift Card Programme

Business Week has posted a recent video interview with Rajive Johri, President of First National Bank of Omaha, who talks about his strategy with his online bank, FNBO Direct.

Javelin Strategy & Research has announced a new report titled "Mobile Payments Forecast: Contactless Evolution Flounders Without Heightened Attention to Merchants And Wireless Carriers" by analyst Bruce Cundiff.   » Continue Reading

Discover announced second quarter results today reporting that its US card business grew managed credit card receivables 6% over the same period last year to $46.9 billion on a growth in sales volume of 5% to $22.1 billion. The company reported an over 30 day delinquency rate of 2.97%, 23 basis points lower than last year’s second quarter and 34 basis points below the first quarter of 2007. The net charge-off rate of 4.00% was up 82 basis points from the same period last year and 19 basis points from the first quarter of 2007. Debit card transactions processed on the PULSE Network grew 19% to 559 million.

Reuters reports on plans by some European banks to link their national debit card systems together as an alternative to either Mastercard's Maestro scheme or V-Pay operated by Visa Europe. According to the report, debit cards issued in Germany, Britain, Italy, Spain, Portugal and Austria will initially be part of the new EAPS system.

In a press release headlined "Leave the Cash at Home", Obopay has announced that "Verizon Wireless customers will soon have another option when they shop other than just cash or credit -- they will be able to pay using their wireless phones."   » Continue Reading

American Express Company Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Kenneth I. Chenault has announced management changes to reflect a reorganization of the company into two distinct customer-focused groups:

• Alfred F. Kelly, Jr., now president of American Express Company, will head the Global Consumer Group.
• Edward P. Gilligan, now vice chairman of American Express Company, will head the Global Business-to-Business Group.

Kelly and Gilligan will both report to Chenault.   » Continue Reading

The Sun's Financial Diary blog has a post comparing the various online checking plus savings account alternatives - and finds the richest combination of yields at Presidential Bank.

Google Checkout has announced a new program that provides participating merchants a discount of up to 21 percent on their FedEx shipping costs.

Phoenix Payment has announced the results of its tenth annual Consumer Payments Preferences and Usage Study examining consumer preferences and usage of payment methods at point-of-sale and for recurring bills. According to Phoenix Payment, this year’s study "delved more deeply than those of prior years into the shift to debit card usage and consumers’ attitudes toward both PIN and signature debit payments."

“Debit card usage is growing, and consumers clearly prefer PIN to signature debit,” stated Ken Kerr, Vice President of Phoenix Payments. “Our analysis shows clients the reasons. We also break down changes in payment behavior by customer segments. Everyone has a cell phone, but the phone as a payments channel is being over-hyped. Consumers have serious security concerns, and few see a compelling reason to switch from cards to phones for payments. The analysis reveals consumers’ appetite for phone and other payment methods, and it identifies barriers to cell phone adoption that must be addressed.”

Brian Fonseca reports for Computerworld on a discussion about the Payment Card Industry (PCI) Data Security Standard at the Symantec Vision user conference in Las Vegas last week. Fonseca writes that "as some retail executives openly criticize the PCI standard, for levying unfair costs and IT burdens upon their organizations, the financial services executives fired back by noting that high-profile data breaches at retailers like The TJX Companies Inc. ar