Fed Staff Interpretation of Reg. II Creates Precarious Limbo for Debit and Prepaid By Marilyn Bochicchio, CEO, and Brad Fauss, EVP and General Counsel, Brightwell Payments It’s April 3, two days past the effective date for the Durbin Amendment exclusivity routing rules for prepaid. And, many prepaid (and, likely, debit) executives in the United States […]
Nasdaq OMX Group is to acquire bond platform eSpeed from BCG for $750 million in a move that highlights the increasing tendency for large stock exchanges to diversify as capital markets revenues from equity trading continue to decrease.
A new generation of ATMs that offer customers more personalised services will provide a core tool for increasing levels of banking competition, according to a new report by business consultancy Navigant.
Dutch bank ING has appointed Ron van Kemenade as its new CIO. Van Kemenade has 20 years of experience in the financial services and online sectors. Previously CIO of ING in the Netherlands, the promotion will see him CIO for the entire ING Bank. Van Kemenade joined ING in 2003 as Internet manager at Postbank […]
Standard Chartered has appointed Peter Burnet as its regional head of corporate finance for northeast Asia. In his new role, Burnett will cover project and export finance, mergers and acquisitions advisory, structured trade finance, financing solutions and equity capital markets.
Nordic bank Alandsbanken has chosen risk management tools from SunGard, which it says will help the bank to comply with new financial regulations. SunGard’s Ambit Risk and Ambit Performance products will be used by the bank to manage interest rate and liquidity risk and help the bank keep track of its balance sheet.
Bank of America Merrill Lynch has launched a service aimed at helping smaller banks to cope with Dodd-Frank rules for US cross-border trades.
With government officials considering a FinCEN anti-money laundering rule that would require consumers to report when they transport prepaid cards, along with cash and/or monetary instruments, with a value of more than $10,000 into or out of the country, representatives from three payment card networks went to the White House to request the rule be […]
Online merchants using Minneapolis-based Digital River Inc.’s e-commerce platform may now add paysafecard, a European-based prepaid electronic payment option, to their consumer checkout menus, the companies said. Paybefore Award-winning paysafecard, founded in 2000 in Austria, provides prepaid payment services for more than 450,000 European and U.S. merchants in 33 countries. Adding paysafecard “makes online purchasing […]
London-based prepaid voucher provider Ukash is rolling out a new service that will enable customers to turn their vouchers back into cash. Set to debut later this month, the Cash Withdrawals service lets users turn their game winnings or Ukash transaction change into cash at more than 24,000 PayPoint-enabled retailers throughout the U.K. Previously, Ukash […]
Mobile payments are evolving at different rates around the globe, with Asia leading other regions including Latin America, Europe and North America in growth. However, progress is uneven and it remains unclear which payment technology will prevail worldwide, according to a new report from Amsterdam-based payments consulting firm Innopay. In Japan, for example, contactless payments […]
Many debit and prepaid card issuers are scrambling to make provisions as of today with debit card routing rules under the Durbin Amendment and the General Use Prepaid Exemption. Issuers were caught off guard as a result of FAQs, representing a Federal Reserve Board staff clarification of the requirements, released quietly by the Fed in […]
Consumers and businesses inside and outside of China may have enhanced online payment options now that Chinese online commerce giant Alibaba Group and MasterCard have signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) to work together on e-commerce. In addition to enhancing e-commerce, the companies said key goals of the MOU include working to help combat intellectual […]
Prepaid cards represent “the next chapter” of electronic government payments, according to a new report from the Center for Financial Services Innovation (CFSI) and the Hudson Institute, which outlines ways to make benefit disbursement cards even more beneficial to recipients. One approach to improving benefit cards is by increasing the choice of card products available […]
A new money transfer service is providing Nigerians with a way to manage and access their Western Union remittances via their mobile phones. VCASH subscribers can use the service, which was launched last week by Western Union Co. and Nigerian mobile payment operator Virtual Terminal Network, to transfer individual Western Union remittances up to US$300 […]
Hungary this fall will roll out a uniform system for paying transportation costs via mobile phone. The National Mobile Payments System will be run by Nemzeti Mobilfizetési, a state-run company, while various mobile payment providers will act as resellers, according to a report in the Budapest Business Times. The platform initially will enable mobile payments […]
Enterprise data management vendor GoldenSource has added support for the ISO 17442 Legal Entity Identifier standard to its systems
Barclays has appointed Yera Hagopian as global head of liquidity product within its cash management team. Hagopian joins Barclays from JP Morgan where she was EMEA head of liquidity.
Reports have swirled for the past week or more that the European banks that own Visa Europe might soon exercise an option to sell the organization to U.S.-based Visa Inc. and set up a new network of their own. Although Visa Europe members may be driving the sale, taking control of the European network could […]
Redwood City, Calif.-based payment processor i2c Inc. has added enhanced features to its payments platform that enable users to budget spending by using multiple purses within one account. i2c’s platform, known as MCP, enables companies to launch and manage card-based, virtual and mobile payment products to their customers. With the new features, i2c clients can […]
Canada’s national ATM and debit network Interac this week announced the completion of the nation’s first NFC mobile debit transaction in a demonstration at a Toronto McDonald’s restaurant. The transaction showcasing the contactless EMV Interact Flash technology was conducted with an NFC-ready BlackBerry smartphone linked to a RBC Royal Bank customer’s bank account through mobile […]
India’s government has launched an electronic money order service, opening a channel for citizens living abroad to purchase an electronic Indian postal order (eIPO) over the Internet. India established eIPOs for Indian citizens outside the country to pay for Right to Information requests, which enables citizens to request data and other information from any public […]
Japan’s Mizuho International has adopted the common reporting, financial reporting and liquidity coverage ratio modules of Wolters Kluwer’s Basel III toolkit, which is designed to help banks cope as regulators tighten the screws on the banking sector’s capital requirements.
US derivatives giant CME Group and OTC trade processing service MarkitServ have connected to support clearing for OTC FX transactions, ahead of new regulations in the US and Europe on the central clearing of OTC contracts.
European payment processor Equens plans to offer a number of services to the Dutch business community to support them in the migration to Single Euro Payments Area formats
Post-trade services provider Omgeo has appointed Edward Hazel of Goldman Sachs, Richard Taggart of State Street and Susan Cosgrove of the DTCC to its board of managers. The Omgeo board members are responsible for representing the interests of all Omgeo’s clients as decisions about strategy, governance and operations are made. Hazel is the global co-head […]
Banks in the UK and Ireland need to adjust to changing consumer behaviour as customers cut back on the amount of time they spend banking online and visiting bank branches, according to new research by Accenture.
By Adam Perrotta, Assistant Editor Oakland, Calif., residents who lack bank accounts and U.S. government-issued photo IDs now have an option for electronic payments and identification. While several U.S. cities issue identification cards for residents who need an ID, the program’s backers say the Oakland City ID Prepaid MasterCard is the first to also act […]
Japan Exchange Group has set out plans to slash 8.5 billion Japanese yen (£60 million) from its annual operating costs by 2015 – representing 15% of the firm’s overall budget – as the exchange seeks to revitalise its equities and derivatives markets and take on its competitors.
Danish bank Ringkjøbing Landbobank has adopted a corporate actions tool from SmartStream Technologies, which it says should increase levels of automation and lead to a more efficient service for customers.
In future, the possibility of a bank failure will be accepted as a normal market process, and barriers to entry for new start-ups, including a removal of capital requirement obstacles, will be removed, the Financial Services Authority and the Bank of England have confirmed.
In this installment of our Paybefore Awards coverage, get to know each of the winning programs in the following categories: Industry Achievement Winner: Brooks Smith Industry Achievement Winner: Roy Sosa Best Network Branded Gift Card Program Most Effective Closed-Loop or RAN Prepaid Card Program Best General Purpose Reloadable Card Program-U.S. Solutions Best General Purpose Reloadable […]
By Kate Fitzgerald, Emerging Payments Editor The proliferation of mobile wallet concepts enabling consumers to make payments with smartphones and tablets already may seem daunting, but get ready for more. Experts say it’s still quite early in the cycle as card-based payments morph into new, mobile forms with countless approaches to enriching the shopping process […]
American Express and Walmart today announced that accounts held under the companies’ Bluebird program now will be eligible for FDIC insurance and, as such, will be able to receive direct deposit of government disbursements, including Social Security payments, military pay and tax refunds. The companies also have added a pre-authorized check-writing function, as well as […]
Allpoint Network, the Bethesda, Md.-based ATM network operator, has expanded its surcharge-free network by 5,000 new cash machines located across the upper Midwest and northern Plains states. Allpoint’s surcharge-free ATM network, already the world’s largest, according to the company, now totals more than 55,000 machines across North America, the U.K. and Australia. An affiliate of […]
Spain’s Banco Sabadell, operating under various local bank brands from its headquarters in the city of Sabadell, has launched an NFC payments pilot with mobile network operator Telefónica and BlackBerry. Participating customers will receive an NFC-enabled BlackBerry Curve smartphone with their Visa payment card details stored in the handset, the bank said. Customers may download […]
The decision by Senate Banking Committee chairman Tim Johnson, (D-S.D.), to retire next year opens a race for another Senate seat and simultaneously puts leadership of the influential banking committee into play. Sen. Johnson, 66, today announced that he will not run again when his current term ends in 2014, leaving a vacant seat that […]
Zappix, a Boston-based mobile portal and customer service app company, has announced the hiring of two executives. Shay Artzi, Ph.D, joins Zappix as chief technical officer and Gal Steinberg as vice president of marketing. Artzi previously served as senior software engineer for IBM, where he was a key member of a software group leading the […]
Skrill, one of Europe’s largest payment providers, has appointed Neil Steinhardt, currently managing director of paysafecard.com USA Inc., to the position of CEO at Skrill USA Inc. He will be responsible for the management and continued growth of Skrill and paysafecard USA, including shaping the evolution of e-wallets in the United States. Steinhardt brings payment processing […]
Alegeus Technologies, a Waltham, Mass.-based health care and benefit payments solutions provider, has appointed John Park chief strategy officer, Matthew Francis chief sales officer and Robert Pinataro chief service officer. Park will lead corporate strategy and corporate development for Alegeus. Prior to joining the company, he was a senior leader at CIGNA Healthcare, responsible for […]
