Issuing/Originating

Confirming long-standing industry speculation, Columbus, Ga.-based bank-holding company Synovus Financial Corp. on Tuesday said it would consider spinning off its processing subsidiary, Total System Services Inc. (TSYS), to Synovus shareholders. Assuming a spin-off eventually happens, TSYS will have played a key role in 2007's major processing-industry restructuring that will take …

With an eye to Capital One Financial Corp.'s introduction last month of a so-called decoupled debit card product, which relies on settlement through the automated clearing house network and so does not require cardholders to have a demand-deposit account with Cap One (Digital Transactions News, June 7), debit network sponsor …

Image-exchange networks and the financial institutions that use them to process checks electronically may have to contend with a dwindling supply of checks sooner than they expected. For the time being, the networks are doing a robust business, with the volume of items expected to more than quadruple this year, …

Discover Financial Services LLC, whose shares began trading on Monday on the New York Stock Exchange, is finally on its own as a corporate entity for the first time in its 22-year- history. But while the spin-off from parent company Morgan Stanley is complete, Discover's mission of gaining market share …

In a move that could give the market for network-branded prepaid cards a big boost, Parago Inc. has launched a campaign to move its clients from checks to one-time-use cards for rebates and cash incentives. The Dallas-based company, which manages consumer rebate and rewards programs for corporations, hopes to have …

A new Capital One Financial Corp. MasterCard debit card that Cap One can market nationwide like a credit card has the potential to vault the financial-services company into the top ranks of debit card issuers and help MasterCard Worldwide swipe debit market share from Visa USA, the payments expert who …

Information is beginning to emerge indicating that consumer usage of contactless devices for payments may be picking up. According to an Internet survey conducted by Atlanta-based Synergistics Research Corp. late last year, 9% of respondents had used a contactless card or fob. In two previous surveys, both conducted by phone …

Consumers are more loyal to the form of payment they prefer than they are to any particular retail brand, a situation that could work to the benefit of card issuers and processors but also merchants, a retail consultant says. In a survey cited by Gary Charboneau, president of Wakefield, R.I.-based …

In the battle against the online fraud known as phishing, March brought a mix of good news and bad, with dramatic drops in malicious software offset by a steep rise in targeted brands, according to the latest report from an organization that tracks the fraud. Separately, the U.S. Commerce Department …

The volume of unique phishing attacks hit an all-time high in January, while fraudsters broadened their reach to spoof Web sites they hadn't targeted before, such as social-networking and gambling sites, according to a group that tracks phishing fraud. The number of unique phishing e-mails hit 29,930, up 26% over …