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Though Capital One Financial Corp. and prepaid card manager NetSpend Holdings Inc. late on Monday said they had “mutually agreed” to call off Cap One’s planned $700 million cash acquisition of NetSpend, the move may have been a consequence of the deal’s hefty price tag, says an analyst who follows …
Read More »With Plug-In, PayPal Looks for Expanded E-Commerce Reach
PayPal Inc. on Tuesday will make available to its entire account base a so-called virtual debit card it has been testing with a large number of account holders for nearly 18 months. The new product, which PayPal has dubbed Plug-In, carries a MasterCard Worldwide brand and allows users to buy …
Read More »Before IPO, Visa Reaches a $2.25 Billion AmEx Antitrust Settlement
In an attempt to clear away legal issues before its planned initial public stock offering next year, Visa Inc. today said it would pay rival American Express Co. more than $2 billion to settle an antitrust lawsuit AmEx brought seeking compensation for lost business during the years a Visa rule …
Read More »With a Grip on Costs, TSYS Continues Its Post-BofA Recovery
Bolstered by cost controls and its growing international business, payment processor Total System Services Inc. (TSYS) on Monday reported profits rose nearly 27% on a revenue increase of not quite 4%. TSYS also said operating margins are up more than 3 percentage points this year to 25.6%. Columbus, Ga.-based TSYS …
Read More »Report: Debit Card Outlook Bright, But Banks Failing on Activation
Debit cards remain the fastest-growing payment devices and they seem likely to endure a possible economic slowdown better than credit cards, according to a new report from TowerGroup Inc. Nevertheless, financial institutions have a propensity to pump out many more debit cards than consumers want. According to the report, “Crediting …
Read More »Discover Boosts Issuing Prospects Among Banks with TSYS Deal
In a move that could give it a big boost in signing up banks to issue cards on its network, Discover Financial Services Inc. on Tuesday announced a deal with TSYS Inc. under which TSYS clients will be able to issue Discover credit and prepaid cards and use TSYS for …
Read More »Why Once-Soaring Contactless Payment Has Lost Some Altitude
Data Insecurity Part 7 In the lore of payments innovations, there's a maxim that seems to always hold true: Before you ever reach critical mass, beware of the New York Times article that raises questions about your security or operability. If you can't weather that storm, your payments innovation will …
Read More »The New Irony of Signature Cards: Good at Fraud, Bad at Risk
Data Insecurity Part 5 While absolute dollars of fraud are rising with volume, the payments industry has done a commendable job in managing risk. For every $100 in purchases with signature-based credit cards, only about a nickel winds up as fraud?about one-third what it was 15 years ago?and that rate …
Read More »How a Data-Security Debate Is Holding Back NFC Payments
Tussles between vendors and financial institutions over data security are slowing down progress in contactless payment based on mobile phones, a research firm contends. While MasterCard Worldwide, Visa USA, and major banks like JPMorgan Chase & Co. and Citigroup Inc. have launched trials of handset-based contactless payment in the U.S. …
Read More »More Consumers Use Card Sites to Pay Bills, Manage Accounts
Consumers' willingness to pay credit card bills online is rising rapidly, with 524 million transactions in 2006, a 27% jump over 414 million payments in 2005, according to survey data from comScore Inc. The most recent online payment volume, which represents payments consumers make at card issuers' Web sites, is …
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