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Payments executives already know the coming changeover from magnetic-stripe cards to chip cards using the Europay-Visa-MasterCard (EMV) standard will be expensive—about $11 billion, according to a new report from Aite Group LLC. But Aite notes that while likely to greatly reduce fraud at the point of sale, the big switcheroo …
Read More »Green Dot To Take Over Walmart MoneyCard from Long-Time Issuer GE Capital
Prepaid card program manager Green Dot Corp. will take over direct issuance of the Walmart MoneyCard prepaid card from General Electric Co.’s GE Capital Retail Bank under a deal Green Dot announced on Monday. The acquisition continues Pasadena, Calif.-based Green Dot’s effort to consolidate issuance of the prepaid card …
Read More »FDIC Signals Increased Non-Bank Scrutiny with Action Against Prepaid Program Manager
In an action that appears to signal stepped-up scrutiny of non-bank prepaid card distributors by federal banking regulators, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. on Friday announced it is fining Achieve Financial Services LLP $110,000 and forcing it to pay at least $1.1 million in restitution to consumers. The FDIC also …
Read More »Visa’s U.S. EMV Card Count More Than Doubles in Nine Months, Albeit from a Tiny Base
Europay-MasterCard-Visa (EMV) chip cards have entered the classic phase of huge percentage growth from a very small base, according to new U.S. figures from Visa Inc. The leading network this week reported that American financial institutions had issued 3.5 million Visa-branded EMV cards as of March 31, an increase of …
Read More »Head of Nascent Chase Merchant Services Sees Opportunity, Keeps Mum About Specifics
The fledgling Chase Merchant Services operation may now have a boss, but that doesn’t mean the considerable industry curiosity about the JPMorgan Chase & Co. payments unit is going to be quenched any time soon. Chase officials, beginning with newly appointed CMS chief executive Mike Passilla, are playing it …
Read More »Google’s Decision to Ditch Its Card Adds to Search Giant’s List of Woes in Wallets
Google Inc.’s apparent decision to abandon its plan to launch a plastic card as part of its Google Wallet service is yet another sign of how major mobile-wallet players from outside the payments business are struggling to find a winning strategy, sources tell Digital Transactions News. News of the …
Read More »First Data Picks a Top Chase Executive As Its New CEO
Leading payment processor First Data Corp. reached outside the company over the weekend to tap Frank Bisignano, a veteran operations executive with experience at some of the nation’s largest banks, as its new chief executive officer. Bisignano, most recently co-chief operating officer at JPMorgan Chase & Co., replaces Jonathan …
Read More »New Rivalry from Potent Players Is Moderating Prepaid Card Pricing, Survey Finds
New competition from national and regional players is helping to moderate prepaid card pricing for consumers, according to a survey released on Monday by Bankrate.com. Indeed, the majority of the 24 cards studied by the North Palm Beach, Fla.-based information service now carry no fees at all for such …
Read More »New Data Show Consumers Once Again Are Willing To Pull Out Their Credit Cards
Credit cards began staging a somewhat wobbly post-recession recovery in 2010 and 2011. But new figures from First Data Corp. and Visa Inc. indicate credit card charge volume is back to just about full health. In a mid-March investor presentation, Visa reported that U.S. credit card payment volume increased 11% …
Read More »Is Chase Merchant Services an Omen of a Diminished Role for Merchant Acquirers?
Could the new Chase Merchant Services (CMS) processing entity announced Feb. 26 by JPMorgan Chase and Co. and Visa Inc. be a harbinger of a major change in the way bank card payments operate? The payments industry is abuzz with talk about how CMS could shake things up by enabling …
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