Netbanker's Jim Bruene blogs about how finally there was an article in the Wall St. Journal earlier this week about some of the harsher realities of moving from paper to electronic statements. Yes, there are some very real downsides to electronic - even though banks and brokerage houses would like us to all just accept their seemingly endless offers to go paperless. As Jim points out, the issue is simple - they need to offer us lifetime statement archives. Maybe the banks need to sign up for Amazon's S3 if they can't manage providing the online storage themselves?

Glenbrook's Carol Coye Benson provides the following update on our Payments Boot Camp program: "Glenbrook just wrapped up our Payments Boot Camps for the 2006-2007 "school year". We had lively sessions in New York City last week and in the California this week." Click here to continue reading.   » Continue Reading

The Economist takes a look at Google Checkout vs. PayPal - saying "Google's foray into payments may prove testing for PayPal, but it looks like being great for e-commerce in general."

Lisa Sanders reports for Advertising Age on the move by Anne Saunders from senior VP-global brand strategy and marketing at Starbucks to Bank of America.

The U.S. Departments of Justice, Treasury and Homeland Security have joined together to issue the "2007 National Money Laundering Strategy, a report detailing continued efforts to dismantle money laundering and terrorist financing networks and bring these criminals to justice."   » Continue Reading

A new Packaged Facts report concludes that total contactless credit and debit cards in U.S. circulation will reach 109 million by 2011. According to the report, "with the fast-paced American lifestyle continuing to put pressure on retailers to serve customers more efficiently, and card brands such as MasterCard and Visa pushing for bigger slices of the small-ticket payments pie traditionally reserved for cash, the time is finally right for large-scale penetration of smart cards in the payments market."   » Continue Reading

Cellular South and Obopay have announced the availability of Obopay's mobile payments solution on Cellular South handsets. With Obopay, Cellular South wireless customers can now instantly and effortlessly receive, send and spend money directly from their wireless device to anyone, anywhere, anytime.   » Continue Reading

The Clearing House and BITS have announced that member banks of BITS Payments Strategy Steering Committee (PSSC) have moved their payments initiatives to The Clearing House’s Strategic forum to create a single bank-driven focal point for payments issues for the financial services industry.   » Continue Reading

Visa USA has announced a five-year agreement with ADP Employer Services to offer Visa-branded payroll cards to its clients. According to Visa, "the agreement reflects the two industry leaders’ commitment to grow prepaid card solutions that offer convenience and cost savings for businesses and their employees. The Visa branded ADP Total Pay card is issued by a number of Visa member financial institutions."   » Continue Reading

Tony Adams reports for the Columbus (GA) Ledger-Enquirer about the question of whether Synovus might decide that TSYS would be better equipped to support future growth as a separate standalone company. Although TSYS is already a public company, Synovus currently owns over 80 percent of TSYS' stock.

The Anti-Phishing Working Group (APWG) has announced that the financial services industry, Internet security companies and law enforcement have joined forces to co-host the first Counter eCrime Operations Summit (CeCOS) in San Francisco, California, May 30-31, 2007.   » Continue Reading

ExxonMobil, along with TIO Networks Corporation and NetSpend Corporation, has announced the launch of the TIO Prepaid MasterCard at participating Exxon and Mobil convenience store locations across the United States. The card is issued by MetaBank.   » Continue Reading

• Vodafone’s Elisa Renews Contract With MACH For Financial Clearing & Settlement And Data Clearing
• XIRING is supplying the Royal Bank of Scotland Group with strong authentication solution for online banking
• Twenty-Three Additional Gaming Properties to Begin Using Global Cash Access (GCA) To Provide Patrons with State-of-the-Art Access to Cash

We have received news of the following recent management changes:

• Moin Moinuddin has been named Industry Architect focusing on Retail and Payments at Microsoft Corporation
• Bryan Childerhouse has been named Director, Channel Development, for Chase Paymentech.

Javelin Strategy & Research has announced new report titled "Mobile Banking Security: The Call for Technology Standards and Proactive Security Messaging" (PDF).   » Continue Reading

First Data Corp. has announced a strategic investment in ViVOtech and that it plans to use ViVOtech's collection of emerging technologies that include Near Field Communication (NFC) terminals and mobile commerce enablement. According to First Data, its investment will come in the form of acting as the lead investor in ViVOtech's Series C round of financing.   » Continue Reading

The April 2007 issue of the First Annapolis Navigator is now available (via free email subscription). This is features an interview with Bob Carr of Heartland Payment Systems along with articles on commercial cards, recent card issuer performance, and gift cards.

The Federal Reserve has announced that it will shortly begin a new statistical study of household finances, the Survey of Consumer Finances, intended to provide policymakers with important insight into the economic condition of all types of American families. The survey has been undertaken every three years since 1983 - results from this new survey will be available in 2009.   » Continue Reading

Erin McCune blogs about Brad Smith's article on mobile banking in this week's edition of Wireless Week - noting one bank's claim of a 3 month ROI on their investment to provide mobile banking.

Julian Goldsmith reports for Silicon.com in the UK that "incidents of face-to-face credit and debit card fraud have tumbled by 67 per cent since the introduction of the chip and PIN standard 24 months ago. But card fraud overall has only dipped by a few per cent according to payments industry organisation Apacs, with much of it migrating to card-not-present (CNP) fraud and overseas transactions."

MasterCard reported first quarter financial results this morning - a presentation discussing the results is available online. MasterCard's net revenues for the quarter were $915 million, a 23.9% increase versus the same period in 2006, growth in gross dollar volume (GDV) of 16.4%, on a local currency basis, to $509 billion, and a 19.4% increase in the number of transactions processed to 4.2 billion.

• Fujitsu Announces Launch of U-Scan Genesis Self-checkout
• BISYS Announces Agreement to Be Acquired by Citi
• VeriSign and Innovative Card Technologies Address Worries of Online Merchants With New Fraud Protection That Fits in a Wallet
• American Express and Costco Add New Benefit to the True Earnings(R) Business Card for Small Businesses

Virginia-based Cardinal Bank has announced “Go Cardinal”, a free mobile banking service that allows customers to use their cell phones and smartphones to access their accounts. According to Cardinal, consumers will be able to check balances, pay bills, transfer money, look up interest rates, locate a Cardinal Banking Center or ATM.   » Continue Reading

U.S. Bank has announced it has made an equity investment in InstaMed, a real-time gateway and processor of healthcare and payment transactions. The two companies say they have been working together in a strategic partnership for nearly a year, and have already processed tens of millions of dollars on the InstaMed Platform for various hospitals, healthcare providers, billing services, vendors and payers.   » Continue Reading

Retail Expansion Network has announced that more than 200 Internet retailers have added PaidByCash to their sites, enabling consumers to use cash to make purchases online by obtaining a virtual prepaid MasterCard card account. The new service was launched in the United States two months ago with the PaidByCash Virtual Prepaid MasterCard account issued by First Bank of Delaware.   » Continue Reading

AOC Solutions has announced that "Commerce Bank has selected its Encompass technology to meet the unique needs of the bank’s Purchase, Fleet and Travel Card customers. Encompass is redefining the commercial card market and offering businesses more ways to integrate card payments into their purchasing and payables systems."   » Continue Reading

JPMorgan Chase Commercial Card Solutions sent along the following article about how to take full advantage of purchasing card programs. "Companies around the world have implemented purchasing card programs to help reduce processing fees and simplify the way they do business. But once a PCard program is in place, what can a company do to increase volume and further drive efficiencies and savings? Jim Nelson, Senior Product Consulting Manager for JPMorgan Chase Commercial Card Solutions, recently sat down with purchasing card coordinators from three very diverse industries to learn what tactics users are taking to increase their PCard volume and adoption rate."   » Continue Reading

Copies of the presentations made at the recent Authentication and Online Trust Summit 2007 are available online. Included is a presentation on Ecommerce and Online Banking Fraud (PDF) presented by Karim Noorali, Sr. Product Manager, eBay, Victor Talamo, VP & Director Risk Management, JPMorganChase and Marcelo Camara Banco Bradesco Febraban - Brazilian Banking Organization.

Chase Paymentech has announced a "major expansion of its European operation, with the appointment of Shane Fitzpatrick as managing director, European Union, effective immediately. This position reports directly to Mike Duffy, president and chief executive officer, Chase Paymentech."   » Continue Reading

David Barboza reports for the New York Times on plans by Alibaba to go public sometime later this year.

• Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago, Visa Convene National Summit on Financial Education
• AP: VeriSign to Offer Passwords on Bank Card

We have received news of the following recent management changes:

• Phil Valvardi, former President of MAC Network, has been named Chief Development Officer at FreedomPay.

Voice Pay, calling itself the "world's first voice-verified payment processing system," has launched today. The company says its system uses the customer's own voice as a means of digitally signing and authorizing payments. It incorporates VoiceVault voice biometric authentication technology which is already in use by global banks, insurers and public sector organisations."   » Continue Reading

CFSI has announced the publication of a new paper titled "Mobile Financial Services and the Underbanked: Opportunities and Challenges for Mbanking and Mpayments" (PDF) by Katy Jacob and Caroline Boyd.   » Continue Reading

oDesk, an online marketplace that allows companies to hire, manage and pay remote technical workers around the world, has announced that oDesk providers can now sign up to receive an oDesk prepaid Debit MasterCard to access their earnings from anywhere in the world. The oDesk prepaid Debit MasterCard, powered by Payoneer, will be available to freelance providers and affiliate managers on oDesk in May 2007. oDesk says it is the only remote work marketplace to offer its providers a prepaid debit card as a payment option.   » Continue Reading

• RSA Broadens Reach of RSA SecurID(R) Two-Factor Authentication Solution With Expanded Support for Leading Mobile Device Platforms
• Lightbridge Completes Transformation to a Payment Processing Company With Name Change to Authorize.Net
• YeePay Named a China Internet 100 and Innovator 50 Company
• Ingenico and TASQ Technology expand North American relationship with warranty/service and reseller agreement for all INGENICO Terminal products
• PayPal Honored for Leadership in Online Safety

Emma Smith writes for the London Sunday Times about mobile payments - writing mostly about mobile phones equipped for contactless payments at POS - saying that "the ability for mobile phones to be used as payment devices has long been seen as the holy grail for both phone companies and banks."