Competitive Strategies

Visa USA's increase in credit card interchange rates, announced today, are intended to help the giant bank card network keep its members' business in the face of recent efforts by American Express Co. to court banks as issuers of its cards, Visa says. As expected by many observers, Visa today …

With its new real-time check-verification and settlement product announced yesterday, Star Systems Inc. will be offering merchants and transaction processors a service that converts paper checks to electronic transactions just as retailers and financial institutions are preparing for the advent of check-imaging technology. Though Maitland, Fla.-based Star, the nation's largest …

MasterCard International today announced it is acquiring TowerGroup, the Needham, Mass.-based research firm, from Reuters PLC for an undisclosed price. The 11-year-old TowerGroup, which focuses on payments-technology and financial-services research, will become part of MasterCard Advisors, a subsidiary through which the bank card company operates an existing research and advisory …

A new technology that fights counterfeit card fraud by allowing a sort of “fingerprint” comparison routine based on magnetic stripes is getting its first commercial application with shipments having started within the past few weeks of card-personalization machines enabled with the technology. Kiran Gandhi, vice president for Carson, Calif.-based MagTek …

The immediate reaction among industry observers to the disclosure last week that MasterCard International Inc. is raising its interchange rates on some credit card transaction categories effective April 2 was that the move is meant to recoup issuer income lost in the major debit card settlement reached last year. But …

The news that Barclays PLC is talking to Providian Financial Corp. about buying the San Francisco-based credit card issuer has some observers speculating that the merger could accelerate the development of new electronic transaction products both in the U.S. and in Europe, where Barclays is a major card issuer with …

First Data Corp. says it does not expect an investigation by the U.S. Department of Justice of its money-transfer business to have an effect on the completion of its acquisition of Concord EFS Inc. The Denver-based processor said earlier this week it expects to close the merger with Concord Feb. …

In the wake of its groundbreaking announcement last week that it had signed up MBNA Corp. as the first U.S. bank issuer on its network, American Express Co. yesterday said the MBNA deal is non-exclusive and that it is actively pursuing such arrangements with “plans to form additional partnerships” in …

First Data Corp. officals vowed today they expect to fight hard to add to the debit business of Concord EFS Inc., the debit processor First Data is buying for $6.9 billion. In a meeting with securities analysts to present 2003 full-year and fourth-quarter results, First Data chairman and chief executive …

In a sign of how fast an organization can convert paper transactions to electronic, the National Automated Clearing House Association announced today that the home-mortgage unit of Wells Fargo & Co. will process 88% of its payments electronically in the first quarter, up from 36% only a year ago and …