« January 18, 2009 - January 24, 2009 | Main | February 1, 2009 - February 7, 2009 »
In an article titled "Credit Card Companies Go to War Against Losses", Ron Lieber writes for the New York Times about the actions that US credit card issuers are taking in an effort to reign in credit losses on their credit cards. According to Lieber, the steps the credit card issuers are taking include raising interest rates, lowering credit limits, adding new fees, and closing accounts.
Mint.com CEO Aaron Patzer has posted a guest column on TechCrunch in which he shares some of the aggregate data that Mint.com has captured from its users sharing their spending data.
READ MORE »Looking across spending as a whole in 2008, we can see a phase change beginning in the summer. After a bump in the May/June time frame from tax refunds and credits, we see spending declined by $400 / month / household. Spending eroded even further (a $200 drop) in November along with consumer confidence, bouncing back only slightly for the holidays.
APACS, the UK payments association, has issued a press release advising "about the recent rise in popularity of an old-style phone scam that involves fraudsters duping unsuspecting cardholders into revealing their card details by pretending to be from either their bank, card company or one of the international card schemes – Visa and MasterCard." READ MORE »
Note: Throughout the day, as Payments News happens, this post is updated. For job opportunities available for payments professionals, visit PaymentsJobs.com. Employers looking to hire payments professionals can post their job openings there as well.
The Mobile Marketing Association (MMA) has announced the publication of its Mobile Banking Overview 
- "an educational resource designed to provide analysis of the unique marketing opportunities and attributes that the mobile channel represents for the financial sector. Key subjects include market size, consumer-focused mobile banking products and services, and the mobile media channels available to banks and other financial institutions. It also provides considerations for optimizing mobile banking communications and campaign effectiveness within each channel."
READ MORE »
Note: Throughout the day, as Payments News happens, this post is updated. For job opportunities available for payments professionals, visit PaymentsJobs.com. Employers looking to hire payments professionals can post their job openings there as well.
CashEdge has announced that it facilitated the acquisition of more than $4.5 Billion in assets for its financial institution clients during 2008 through its online account opening and funding products – OpenNow/FundNow and OpenNow/FundNow Express, an increase of more than 27 percent from 2007. READ MORE »
The Press Association in the UK reports that "one in four Britons have been the victim of credit or debit card fraud, research has shown. Around 26% of people have now had their card used fraudulently, up from 21% when the same research was carried out 12 months ago, according to life assistance group CPP."
Wells Fargo announced 4Q2008 financial results this morning. Average core deposits grew at by 31 percent (annualized) from the prior quarter and the low cost of those deposits gives Wells Fargo the widest net interest margin in the industry. Credit card loans outstanding grew 25% from the year ago quarter to $23.5 billion.
Note: Throughout the day, as Payments News happens, this post is updated. For job opportunities available for payments professionals, visit PaymentsJobs.com. Employers looking to hire payments professionals can post their job openings there as well.
Heartland Payment Systems has announced that "it has formed an internal department dedicated exclusively to the development of end-to-end encryption to protect merchant and consumer data used in financial transactions. For the past year, Robert O. Carr, Heartland's chairman and chief executive officer, has been advocating for payments industry adoption of this technology - which will protect data at rest as well as data in motion - as an improvement for payment transaction security." READ MORE »
In a press release the FDIC announced that "The Board of Directors of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation today proposed for comment a regulatory change in the way the FDIC administers its statutory restrictions on the deposit interest rates paid by banks that are less than Well Capitalized." READ MORE »
Note: Throughout the day, as Payments News happens, this post is updated. For job opportunities available for payments professionals, visit PaymentsJobs.com. Employers looking to hire payments professionals can post their job openings there as well.
After the market close today, American Express announced its financial results for the fourth quarter of 2008.
Overall Amex cardholder spending declined 10% year over year - or 5% when adjusted for foreign exchange rates. In the US, card billed business (including cash advances) declined 8% year over year, falling from $123 billion to $112.7 billion in the fourth quarter 2008. In terms of average cardholder spending, Amex reported it declined 15% to $2,792 for the quarter. The average merchant discount rate remained essentially unchanged at 2.53%.
NCR has launched "a new web-based service for easier and faster management and processing of envelope-free deposits at ATMs. With Intelligent Deposit ATMs already making up more than 70 percent of its 2008 U.S. SelfServ ATM orders, NCR believes its new service – NCR APTRA Deposit Gateway – will significantly help the next wave of financial institutions move to image-based ATMs. NCR APTRA Deposit Gateway is a web-based software-as-a-service (SaaS) solution that enables financial institutions to perform check image processing for envelope-free deposits made at the ATM." READ MORE »
First Data Corp. has a growing collection of white papers in its Thought Leadership Library covering a wide range of payments-related topics. The latest papers include:
- by Barry McCarthy, President, Mobile Commerce Solutions
- by Timothy Horton, Vice President of Product Management
- by Kathleen Houseman, Vice President, Remote Deposit Capture Solutions, and Mark Nevle, Director, Product DevelopmentAmerican Express Global Commercial Card has released a new study "detailing how companies are instituting best practices and driving savings to control their costs in an economic downturn. Working with Accenture, American Express interviewed a number of Fortune 500 companies in industries ranging from consumer products to business services. These companies had median gross revenues of $30 billion, and were identified as having leading T&E spending policies." (Full study here ).
READ MORE »
After a brief rebound in December, economic confidence among small business owners dipped in January as fewer owners plan to increase spending for business development. The Discover Small Business Watch index fell to 71.4 in January, down 1.4 points from December. READ MORE »
Monitise Americas has announced new research results finding that "Americans are increasingly demanding 'always on' information about their money, with 77% saying that it was important for them to have real-time and immediate information regarding their bank and credit card accounts." READ MORE »
Wells Fargo has launched the Wells Fargo Card Design Studio service - saying it "gives consumer and business customers the option to customize the design of their Wells Fargo Check Cards or Credit Cards." READ MORE »
Note: Throughout the day, as Payments News happens, this post is updated. For job opportunities available for payments professionals, visit PaymentsJobs.com. Employers looking to hire payments professionals can post their job openings there as well.
Contacts:
Compilation Copyright © 2002 - 2013 Glenbrook Partners LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Terms of Use Privacy Policy RSS Feed 
Follow Payments News on Twitter for Real-Time Updates
