Over on our sister blog PaymentsViews.com, I share some of my thoughts about today's announcement of American Express acquiring Revolution Money. It's a bold move towards innovation by a company that's been slow to move in the past. Read my post and share your comments - would love to know what you think!

American Express has announced it has agreed to acquire Revolution Money. According to Amex, "the transaction, which is subject to regulatory review, is expected to close in the first quarter of 2010. The purchase price is expected to be approximately $300 million. Upon closing, Revolution Money would operate as a subsidiary of American Express and be the first component of its recently formed Enterprise Growth organization. Enterprise Growth was formed to leverage American Express’ existing assets and capabilities to generate incremental fee revenue and to drive the company’s entry into new payment areas and related businesses." READ MORE

Revolution Money has announced that Fifth Third Bank has joined its Revolution Money network as an issuing bank. According to Revolution, "the combination of Fifth Third Bank’s card-issuing capabilities with Revolution Money’s marketing and customer servicing and communication capabilities will provide a robust platform for expanded adoption of RevolutionCard."

Revolution Money Chairman Ted Leonsis appeared on CNBC this morning to discuss the deal with Fifth Third. He was joined by Jim Robinson III, former Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of American Express, who recently invested in and joined the board of Revolution Money and Steve Case, Co-Founder of AOL and Chairman of Revolution, LLC. READ MORE

Over on PaymentsViews.com, Glenbrook's Allen Weinberg reports on his recent interview with Jason Hogg, CEO of Revolution Money. READ MORE

Today was a very busy day for us over on our sister web site, PaymentsViews.com. Beginning with Carol Coye Benson's update on mFoundry yesterday, today's posts include multiple updates from Bryan Derman live from Finovate2009 and a new interview with the CEO of Revolution Money, Jason Hogg by Allen Weinberg.

Be sure to visit PaymentsViews.com regularly for more of this kind of analysis from your friends at Glenbrook - while we continue to cover the news for payments professionals here on PaymentsNews.com!

In an article titled "When Closing Accounts Is Counter-Revolutionary", Maria Aspan writes for the American Banker about RevolutionCard closing some of their cardholder accounts.

As mentioned earlier by Reuters, Revolution Money has announced it has received $42 million in Series C funding from a Goldman Sachs affiliate (a new investor), as well as AOL co-founder Case, Revolution Money Chairman Ted Leonsis, former Charles Schwab CEO David Pottruck, former JP Morgan Vice Chairman David Golden, Citigroup Inc. and Morgan Stanley. Here's a link to the official press release from the company. READ MORE

Reuters reports this morning that Revolution Money has raised an additional $42 million in financing from a group that includes a Goldman Sachs affiliate and participation from earlier investors Citigroup and Morgan Stanley. Revolution's Steve Case will be speaking this week at NACHA's Payments 2009 Conference in Orlando. See also the WSJ.com Digits blog: Payment Processor Revolution Money Pumped With $42M.

Chase Paymentech and Revolution Money, operator of the RevolutionCard payment network, have announced that Chase Paymentech's processing platforms now enable the acceptance of RevolutionCard transactions for online and retail merchants. Revolution Money says it "currently operates the largest PIN-based acceptance network for credit card purchase transactions in the U.S." READ MORE

Revolution Money has announced that RBS WorldPay (formerly RBS Lynk) will be offering RevolutionCard as a payment option to its merchants. According to the companies, the agreement extends the RevolutionCard network to nearly 300,000 online and physical merchant locations. READ MORE

Revolution Money and CardinalCommerce have announced that, beginning in October, online merchants will be able to accept RevolutionCard payment cards through Cardinal Centinel, Cardinal's platform that allows merchants to enable multiple payment brands through one installation. READ MORE

Revolution Money has announced the introduction of the MoneyExchange RevolutionCard, a PIN-based reloadable card that enables free online person-to-person (P2P) payments to other accountholders, ATM access and retail store purchases -- from a single account. READ MORE

Glenbrook's Russ Jones will be on hand at this year's Direct Response Forum (DRF) to lead a session on August 12th entitled "What We're Watching in Emerging Payments". Looking beyond the current generation of payment alternatives, Russ will be discussing TrialPay, eBillme, Secure Vault Payments, Amazon Payments, RevolutionCard, eLayaway, PaidByCash, and the Green Dot MoneyPak.

Russ will also be participating in a round table discussion on best practices in recurring payments on August 13th. The DRF 2008 conference is being held in San Diego. The full agenda is available online. If you're going to be at the conference, - he'd love to meet you!

On Portfolio.com's Tech Observer blog, Sam Gustin writes about Revolution Money and quotes Jason Hogg, CEO of Revolution Money, as described the company as "we're PayPal meets MasterCard without the fees".

Revolution Money and Shipley Energy have announced that Shipley has become the first energy company to offer a co-branded RevolutionCard. Shipley plans to "periodically boast valuable incentives for consumers when they use their RevolutionCard for qualifying Shipley Energy purchases."

Francine Kizner writes for Entrepreneur.com about alternative payments providers Bill Me Later, eBillMe, Revolution Money, and Bill-to-Phone. "Alternative payment companies entice buyers who may not have credit cards, feel wary about sharing their information online or just want an easier checkout experience."

Fifth Third Processing Solutions and Revolution Money have announced an agreement under which the RevolutionCard can be accepted by Fifth Third
Processing Solutions' merchant customers across the United States, through
Fifth Third's Jeanie network.

The My Money Blog takes a look at Revolution MoneyExchange. "It’s free to send, receive, and withdraw money, but the only funding source allowed is your bank account (no credit cards)." Revolution MoneyExchange's site is here.

Computerworld's Jaikumar Vijayan has conducted an interview with Jason Hogg, CEO of Revolution Money - the company bringing Revolution Card and Revolution Money Exchange to market in the US.

Kris Hundley writes for the St. Petersburg Times about hometown company Revolution Money - saying that "the company's two products, a PayPal competitor called Revolution MoneyExchange and a PIN-based credit card called Revolution Card, are ready to take on the MasterCards and Visas of the world."

Tampa's Fox 13 TV has a video story about the new Revolution Card from Revolution Money. The video emphasizes the lower cost of Revolution Card acceptance for merchants vs. Visa, MasterCard, etc.

Revolution Money's chairman Ted Leonsis and CEO Jason Hogg spoke this week at the Web 2.0 Summit being held in San Francisco. Barron's Eric Savitz captured some of the discussion on his Tech Trader Daily blog. "Leonsis is saying they are looking for way to disrupt the fees in the credit card business, and figure out how to drive some of them back to the consumer." Others writing about the discussion include Information Week's Mitch Wagner. "We want to become to social networks what PayPal is to eBay."

Some additional press coverage this morning regarding Steve Case's new Revolution Money (formerly known as GratisCard):

• USA Today: Account number, name not on this credit card
  
• Washington Post blog: Steve Case Launches Revolution Money

Formerly GratisCard, Revolution Money, a new subsidiary of Steve Case's Revolution LLC, has announced "an innovative new payment platform created to transform the payment industry by drastically altering the economics through Internet-based technology, generating significant consumer and merchant benefits." The company announced the launch of "Revolution MoneyExchange, the first free money transfer service that powers online transactions, and RevolutionCard, the industry's first anonymous, PIN-protected credit card." The company also announced that it is "backed by Citi, Morgan Stanley and Deutsche Bank."

Jaikumar Vijayan writes for ComputerWorld about GratisCard - saying that "when the company launches on April 1, it plans to introduce the nation's first completely anonymous credit card with no name or number and no physical data stored on the card itself."

Brian Grow writes for Business Week about GratisCard - backed by former AOL Chairman Steve Case and scheduled for an April launch. According to Grow, GratisCard intends to stimulate merchant acceptance by charging only 50 basis points in merchant acceptance fees. Whether they can incent bank issuance at that level remains to be seen.

Robin Sidel reports for the Wall St. Journal on Gratis - quoting Jason Hogg, president and chief executive of GratisCard LLC, as saying that "the current [payment card] infrastructure is inefficient and costly."

For more information, see the GratisCard web site.