Merchant

State Bank of India Ltd. on July 28 became the first card issuer in the country to announce plans to convert its entire portfolio of magnetic stripe credit cards to EMV chip-and-PIN formats.

Visa Inc. is overhauling its pricing to spur merchants to route transactions its way and defend a dominant share of the U.S. debit card market, a position endangered by new regulations.

Helped by strong growth in purchase volume outside the U.S., Visa Inc. on July 27 reported healthy across-the-board fiscal third quarter transaction growth.

Consumers filed an estimated 524 consumer statute lawsuits in the first half of July, down from 567 in the second half of June.

Despite a weak national economy and uncertainty over the debt ceiling, business apparently is booming for independent sales organizations.

Payments processor Heartland Payments System Inc. on July 28 said it expects its 2011 earnings to be higher than it previously forecasted after reporting a jump in second-quarter profit and sales.

Foreclosure activity decreased on a year-over-year basis in 178 out of the nation's 211 metropolitan areas with a population of 200,000 or more, according to RealtyTrac, an online marketplace for foreclosure properties.

American Express Co. has nabbed a former Google Inc. executive to run a joint venture with French e-commerce website vente-privee.com.

Hacking suspects may blame their arrests on having picked the wrong target.

JK Harris Co., a tax representation firm based in Charleston, S.C., will pay to settle claims by West Virginia's attorney general's office that it misled consumers about its tax-dispute resolution services.