Debit Cards

New Visa Inc. chief executive Charles W. Scharf used his first earnings conference call with analysts Wednesday to offer an olive branch to U.S. merchants. Scharf’s comments came on the heels of an earnings and operational report for fiscal 2013’s first quarter that show strong U.S. Visa credit card growth …

  Visa Inc. on Monday became the latest payments network to offer the U.S. debit industry a solution for the problem of how to route EMV debit transactions in compliance with federal law. The proposal comes after debit networks on Thursday spurned a solution that MasterCard Inc. floated two weeks …

The good news for prepaid card program manager Green Dot Corp. in the fourth quarter: purchase volumes, revenues, and active cards all increased. The bad news: American Express Co.’s new Bluebird prepaid card now being sold at Wal-Mart Stores Inc.’s U.S. stores is taking some business from Green Dot’s own …

  It took less than two weeks for the Secure Remote Payment Council (SRPc), a consortium of U.S. electronic funds transfer networks, to reject MasterCard Inc.’s offer for EFT networks to use its proprietary Maestro application identifier (AID) to allow processors to route EMV debit transactions according to network choices …

First Data Corp. late on Monday named Ed Labry, president of the big processor’s North American unit, as interim chief executive officer to  replace current chief executive Jonathan J. Judge, who is retiring early for health reasons. The announcement came less than a day before First Data announced mixed fourth-quarter …

A sweeping review by the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City of the Durbin Amendment’s effects warns that competition could be harmed if more payment card networks adopt fixed-pricing plans as they compete for merchant business in the newly regulated debit card environment. The new report is the first of …

Some of the biggest payments companies and debit card issuers this week reported their latest volumes and related data along with their fourth-quarter financials. • American Express Co. late Thursday reported that U.S. card-billed business grew 7% to $155.5 billion from $145.5 billion in 2011’s last quarter. International volume increased …

MasterCard Inc. on Friday proposed a solution that it says would allow merchant acquirers to route EMV debit transactions in compliance with a federal law mandating that merchants have a choice of networks. Under the proposal, MasterCard would open a proprietary application identifier (AID) associated with its Maestro brand to …

Prepaid card program manager Green Dot Corp. launched its GoBank mobile-banking application Tuesday. The app gives struggling Green Dot a powerful weapon to fight competitors for underbanked consumers or those simply dissatisfied with mainstream banks, including American Express Co., issuer of the new, low-fee Bluebird prepaid card account for customers …

Have the Durbin Amendment’s interchange restrictions cut into debit card revenue at the nation’s smaller financial institutions? In the wake of a spin war touched off on Monday by a merchant-controlled lobbying group, the answer appears to be: It depends on whom you ask. Monday morning, the Washington, D.C.-based Merchants …