On the wires:

• Citi Commercial Cards Launches Citi Project Card
• Bill.com Expands Mobile Offering
• Sequent Selects ViVOtech to Provide Trusted Service Manager Software for NFC Mobile Payments

On the web:

• CUinsight: Wescom Resources Group to Market PayPal P2P Solution to Credit Unions
• Marketing Magazine: Starbucks Announces UK Contactless Payment Trial

Headline News is compiled by Glenbrook Partners:

• First Data Announces Big Brand Additions to its eGift Social Marketplace
• American Express to Eliminate Foreign Currency Transaction Fees on U.S. Platinum and Centurion Cards
• WesPay and Northwest Clearing House Association announce intention to merge operations
• Visa Europe launches new contactless payment solution for London’s black cabs

• New York Times: Fed Proposes Rules to Cut Debit Card Fees
• BusinessWeek: Ingenico Gets EU1.44 Billion Offer From Undisclosed Buyer
• globeandmail.com: Rising Credit Card Fees Raise Merchants' Ire In Canada
• Bloomberg: American Express to Buy Munich-based Loyalty Partner

Headline News is compiled by Glenbrook Partners:

• New Mercator Report on the Multi-Form Factor "World Terminal"
• Retail Decisions (ReD) Brings Payment Fraud Prevention to the Latin American Market
• Zuora Powers Subscription Billing for Microsoft Windows Azure and BizSpark One Partner sharpcloud in Three Weeks
• EastNets Unveils New Mobile Remittance Solution at Sibos

• Mashable: Starbucks Stores in New York Now Accepting Mobile Payments
• New York Times: Maybe Your Old Credit Cards Are Smart Enough
• SIBOS Conference: The Future of Money (Video)
• Portals and Rails: Can mobile payment adoption define the "end game" for technology investment?

I've been reading and contributing to Payments News since Scott started the news feed in January 2001. Quite frankly, it's been challenging to contribute something that he hadn't already discovered and posted. But I've always delighted in digging into the far corners of the payments industry that might have escaped his purview. Sometimes the smallest of victories are the sweetest.

As the newly-appointed editor at Glenbrook, I'll be scanning and digesting the day-to-day developments in the payments industry with the same just-the-facts approach. While I have my own thoughts about implications, I'll be leaving my opinions in PaymentsViews.

One of the aspects of Payments News that I personally find valuable in my client work is the historical breadth of the archive. I'll continue to edit with an eye for capturing industry news for the record, tagged by subject, and fully searchable. I know how important this is to Glenbrook's clients and other payment professionals.

I speak for all of Glenbrook when I say we really appreciate your contributions and suggestions. As always, please email them to: editor@paymentsnews.com. And, if you've got news you'd like us to cover on Payments News, the easiest way to get it to us is to email it to: gotnews@paymentsnews.com.

- Russ Jones

After eight years of editing Payments News, I've recently transitioned my role as editor over to my partner Russ Jones.  Russ will now be guiding Glenbrook's efforts to provide a concise "over the shoulder" look at what we're watching in payments-industry news. With Russ in charge, Payments News is in very good hands!

I will continue to be involved in our online activities -  I hope to be writing a bit more for PaymentsViews.com as well as developing some new Glenbrook online services. And, of course, I'll continue in my primary roles as a strategy consultant for Glenbrook and as an instructor in our payments education program! You can always reach me at scott@glenbrook.com.

I'd like to thank the many subscribers and contributors to Payments News who made my time as editor so enjoyable.  You're the best!

- Scott Loftesness

Are you getting an Apple iPad this weekend? We are!

Right out of the box, Payments News should look great on the iPad in the Safari browser viewed in landscape mode. We're looking forward to holding Payments News "in our hands"! We'll be enhancing Payments News even more for our new iPad-equipped readers! - stay tuned!

And, if you're with a financial institution doing new things for/with iPad's, be sure to let us know! We're looking forward to a seeing next-generation online experiences on this device - and want to feature your innovations!

Here's an oldie but goodie from the Payments News archives - April 1, 2005 - five years ago - PayPerPal!

Enjoy!

Thanks very much for reading and subscribing to Payments News. We're in the midst of adding some new features to Payments News that may be of interest to companies in the payments field.

One of the new features we're planning is a new resource library for the distribution/downloading of industry white papers. If your company is interested in learning more about distributing your white papers through Payments News, please contact us at: library@paymentsnews.com and we'll be in touch with more details.

Also, after having received many requests from companies wanting to help sponsor Payments News, we're also planning to transition to a new sponsorship model. If you're interested in learning more about our upcoming sponsorship opportunities, please contact us at: sponsorships@paymentsnews.com.

As always, thanks for your readership and support! We always appreciate hearing from you! Send your comments to us at: feedback@paymentsnews.com. Charter sponsors will receive special benefits.

Best, Scott

Our mission with Payments News continues to be helping folks just like us - payments professionals - quickly and easily stay on top of the news of the day. We try to make it easy for you to "read over our shoulder" and get a tightly edited sense of what's important and relevant. That's what we try to do every business day. PN is a daily complement to Glenbrook's other payments education offerings including our Payments Boot Camps and our new Payments Essentials webinar series.

Payments News once again had a very busy year in 2009 - serving almost 3 million page views to over 2 million unique visitors. Over the year, our daily email distribution subscribers grew by over 1,100 to over 6,500 readers. Over 4,500 readers follow PaymentsNews daily via our RSS feed.

And, over 1,200 readers have been following Payments News in real-time via our Payments News Twitter feed launched late last year. We tweeted over 3,000 news stories in 2009!

This year, we also added a Payments News Facebook page - so you can easily become a fan and follow us on Facebook.

Looking back over the 2009, here are the top 5 most viewed individual news stories posted to Payments News this year:

1. Chase Launches New Ultimate Rewards Program
2. Bank of America's Add It Up Offers Cash Back for Online Shopping
3. MasterCard Launches Priceless Picks iPhone Application
4. 100,000,000 Accounts in Apple's iTunes
5. A Look at PayPal's Adaptive Payments

The top 5 most viewed categories/tags on Payments News for 2009 were:

1. Chase Card Services
2. Mobile Payments
3. Citi Cards
4. Prepaid Cards
5. Merchant Acquirers

Thanks very much for reading Payments News in 2009 - we hope you're finding it a valuable daily tool. We always welcome reading your comments and suggestions - please send them to us here! We're looking forward to an even more exciting 2010 - and wish you all the best too!

Another highlight of 2009 was the launch of our sister "rants and opinions" blog: PaymentsViews.com in February under the leadership of Erin McCune. An active blogger herself, Erin's worked hard to get all of us at Glenbrook sharing our thoughts on the latest happenings in payments. Perhaps the best example is Carol Coye Benson's series of articles sharing her insights and observations on mobile payments based on interviews she conducted with the leading U.S. and Canadian companies in this market!

Thanks again for your readership of Payments News and Payments Views! Best wishes for a great 2010 from all of us at Glenbrook Partners!

Are you active on Twitter? Did you know that you can follow us on Twitter too? Both PaymentsNews.com and PaymentsViews.com have Twitter feeds that you can follow to get real-time updates for our postings:

• PaymentsNews
• PaymentsViews

Follow us and get our updates as real-time tweets!

If you're a payments geek who's always on the lookout for payments-related news, you might enjoy the Payments News section we've recently added to Google News. You can find the new payments news section listed here.

If you're logged into Google News, you simply click to add the section to your personalized version of Google News - and follow more payments news to your heart's delight! There's even an RSS feed - if you prefer following it in your news reader!

Hope this helps you find even more payments-related news! If you prefer a more concise, edited compilation, we hope you'll continue just reading PaymentsNews.com!

Are you looking for real-time updates when new items are posted on PaymentsNews.com and PaymentsViews.com? The best way to receive them is to follow our Twitter feeds for PaymentsNews.com and for PaymentsViews.com. Over 1,200 payments professionals are now following our two Twitter feeds - if you're an avid Twitter use, feel free to join them!

Are you as big a fan of Apple's iPhone (and iPod touch) as I am? If so, here's a reminder about an iPhone edition of Payments News that we've specially tailored for viewing on the iPhone. You can find it here: http://www.paymentsnews.com/m

There's a relative dearth of interesting payments-related news today. Obviously, the post-Labor Day announcement strategy is a thing of the past in the current economy! If you've got any interesting news to share, please send it to gotnews@paymentsnews.com!