Headlines:
Carreker in $5M Stock Buyback LaSalle Using Zions' Imaging Software Digital Envoy Beefs Up IP Address Tool Royal of Canada Using New Database
Carreker in $5M Stock Buyback
Facing weak sales and profits, Carreker Corp. is planning to spend up to $5 million to buy back its own stock over the next six months.
John D. "Denny" Carreker, the Dallas software vendor's chairman and chief executive, said Monday in a press release that buying back the stock would enhance shareholder value.
"We believe that the stock repurchase program represents the confidence that our board of directors and management have in our business, strategy, and future," he said.
A month ago Carreker reported a net loss of $1.1 million, or 4 cents a share, for its fiscal fourth quarter, which ended Jan. 31, compared with a year-earlier profit of $1.4 million, or 6 cents a share. Its revenue fell 13%, to $28.9 million.
The announcement of the buyback plan drove Carreker's stock up 7% Monday, to $4.45 a share.
LaSalle Using Zions' Imaging Software
LaSalle Bank Corp., a unit of ABN Amro Holding NV of Amsterdam, has started using remote check-image capture and electronic clearing software from NetDeposit Inc., a unit of Zions Bancorp of Salt Lake City.
NetDeposit said last week that LaSalle, the holding company for LaSalle Bank of Chicago and Standard Federal Bank of Troy, Mich., would offer the software to corporate and merchant customers of the two banks.
A spokesman for LaSalle said it has begun a pilot test of the software with a few business customers and could offer it more widely by midyear.
Digital Envoy Beefs Up IP Address Tool
Digital Envoy Inc. of Norcross, Ga., an online security technology company, has added two features to its Internet Protocol address analysis product.
IP Inspector Fraud Analyst uses a computer's IP address - the string of numbers that identifies specific computers on the Internet - as a second authenticating factor, in addition to the user's password. It also compares the computer's Internet connection to the customer's usual connection.
One of the new features analyzes the user's activity after logging on, to assess each transaction's risk.
The other comes into play only when the user is making an online account application; it compares the postal address on the application to the user's IP address.
Royal of Canada Using New Database
Royal Bank of Canada has started using a real-time foreign-exchange database developed by the British telecommunications company Cable and Wireless PLC.
The agreement was announced last week. Cable and Wireless said the agreement made Royal Bank the first banking company to provide nostro information - data on currency-account balances on deposit with foreign bank trading partners - over the SwiftNet FileAct service operated by the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication.
Royal Bank, of Toronto, is the largest interbank clearer of Canadian dollars.
Cable and Wireless' Real Time Nostro provides intraday account information to currency-trading banking companies. Bank of America Corp., Citigroup Inc., and JPMorgan Chase & Co. use the system to transmit data through other networks.
"The service gives our clients a tool that can be used to improve liquidity management, mitigate risk and achieve operational efficiencies," Ian Toone, Royal Bank's vice president of global financial institutions, said in a Cable and Wireless press release.
