When in 2010 our solons in Congress enacted the Dodd-Frank Act with its Durbin Amendment controlling various aspects of the debit card business, many who opposed this mischievous amendment (including us) did so on principles of free-market economics. We pointed out, for example, that the very merchants who were lobbying …

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 …

Now that the debit card interchange controls mandated by the Durbin Amendment have been in place for nearly a year-and-a-half, observers have decided to check in on the small financial institutions exempted by Durbin to see whether their fears about the law have been proven by experience. You may recall …

Peter Lucas The card networks’ gambit to rapidly accelerate EMV terminal rollout by waiving PCI compliance reporting for merchants is falling short. Sometimes what looks to be a great deal is not all it’s cracked up to be. Offers by the payment card networks to accelerate the U.S. deployment of …

Lauri Giesen Will PIN debit for online transactions ever take off? Some backers are hopeful for this year, but others argue the Durbin Amendment and alternative technologies—like mobile payments—could make PIN debit irrelevant for e-commerce.Time was, the case for online retailers to accept debit card transactions secured with a PIN …

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 …

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 …

The Shazam debit network on Monday took a step closer to entering the fray for near real-time person-to-person payments with the launch of its Shazam Bolts mobile app. The app, which works on smart phones and tablets running Apple Inc.’s iOS software, will initially enable financial-institution customers to receive alerts …

Spot Credit And Mobile Fuel Online Sales There’s been an awful lot of buzz about mobile payments the past few years, and now the payment method is starting to register. Indeed, 2012 marked the first time mobile-originated transactions accounted for a meaningful share of online purchase volume, says Beth Robertson, …

Elizabeth Whalen Nobody likes to pay for parking, but mobile-payment technology is making it more convenient—and creating a potentially huge market for parking-lot companies and technology firms alike. It was on a trip to Ireland in 1997 that David Douglas first discovered that consumers could pay for parking with a …