eBillme has announced it will host a webinar on Wednesday, May 14, where Russ Jones of Glenbrook Partners will provide an in-depth look at the retailer integration process for several alternative payment options including: Bill Me Later, eBillme, Google Checkout, and PayPal.   » Continue Reading

Phoenix Payments has announced the results of its 2007 Consumer Payments Preferences and Usage Study: Debit Card Opportunities and Challenges. The study findings include a detailed report on debit card issues, covering consumer preferences, attitudes, and usage of debit cards as well as debit’s relationship to other payment methods.   » Continue Reading

A new study of debit cards in the US market commissioned by PULSE identified superior performance by “best-in-class” issuers - 'suggesting significant untapped potential in debit for many financial institutions.'   » Continue Reading

Erin McCune blogs the best of show awards for today's Finovate Startup conference. My notes from the company presentations are available here. It was a great event, extremely fast paced and a lot of fun. Be sure to read Erin's coverage as well.

There's a BayPay meeting for San Francisco Bay Area payments professionals being held tomorrow night, Wednesday, April 30, from 6-9 PM. The topic is "From Mobile Banking to Mobile Payments". If you're already a BayPay member, you should have already received the details on meeting location, etc. If you're not a BayPay member and would like to join, contact me directly and I'll fill you in on the details.

We're live at the wonderful UCSF Conference Center in the Mission Bay of San Francisco - about a minute until the first demo session begins at FinovateStartup. We'll be updating this post with our notes from the demos through the day.   » Continue Reading

CyberSource and China-based PayEase Technology Ltd. have announced a collaboration to facilitate merchants’ entry into the China market. With the PayEase/CyberSource solution, merchants gain support for both Chinese credit cards as well as debit cards from over 20 key banks.   » Continue Reading

Yesterday, Visa Inc. announced its first quarter of financial results since going public. The press release and an accompanying presentation are available online along with a webcast of the conference call held yesterday discussing the results.

CTST 2008, the largest payment, security and identification conference in the Americas, is being held this year May 12th through 15th at the Orange County Convention Center West, in Orlando, Fla. International industry leaders presenting during the Mobile and NFC Track include: 3G Americas, Aite Group, Authentec, Bay Area Rapid Transit District, Booz Allen Hamilton, Cassis International, Cellular South, Citibank, FireThorn, First Annapolis Consulting, First Data, Gemalto, Giesecke & Devrient, Infineon Technologies, Inside Contactless, Motorola, Nokia, NTT DoCoMo, NXP Semiconductors, Sprint Nextel, StoLPaN, Venyon, ViVOtech and Vodafone.   » Continue Reading

MasterCard has reported its financial results for the first quarter of 2008. Net revenue for the first quarter of 2008 was $1.2 billion, a 29% increase versus the same period in 2007 with currency fluctuations (driven by movement of the euro and the Brazilian real relative to the U.S. dollar) contributing 5.1% of the increase in net revenue for the quarter MasterCard's gross dollar volume increased 14.1%, on a local currency basis, to $611 billion.

Keith Regan looks at Bill Me Later in a post on eCommerceTimes.com saying that "credit card-free alternative Bill Me Later has proven that merchants and consumers alike are hungry for alternatives."

Damian Paletta writes for the Wall St. Journal that "the Federal Reserve and two other regulators [OTS and NCUA] plan to propose strict policies on credit-card issuers after criticism that card companies charge too many hidden fees and unfairly raise interest rates on borrowers." He says the plan is expected to be introduced by the Fed at a meeting this Friday.

• CyberSource Announces First Quarter 2008 Financial Results
• Economic Times (India): RBI is looking at extending mobile-banking services to the alerge population
• SimpleTuition Adds Discover Student Loans
• BankServ Completes Mandatory FedLine Conversions Eight Months Prior to Federal Reserve Deadline
• Integrated Bank Technology and Recovery Solutions Partner to Assist Banks in Compliance Plans with New Federal Regulatory Standards
• Charlotte Observer: Charlotte IBM exec plugs into the bank biz
• 3i Infotech to buy Regulus Group for $80 mln
• Beyond Phishing - Cronto Helps De-Mystify the Growing Threat of Internet Banking Fraud with New Report
• Los Angeles Times: Fed criticized at hearing on Bank of America takeover of Countrywide

We have received news of the following recent management changes:

• Joseph Saunders has been named Vice President, Business Development, at Digital Resolve. Previously, Saunders was responsible for new market development at TARGUSinfo.