Silicon Valley Bank has joined the small number of U.S. banks that offer U.S. residents EMV chip cards, more commonly issued overseas.
The Santa Clara, Calif.-based subsidiary of SVB Financial Group on June 1 said it is offering chip-based credit cards to its predominantly technology-focused business customers.
Like other U.S. banks that have begun issuing cards that adhere to the EMV Integrated Circuit Card Specifications, Silicon Valley also will include magnetic stripes on the new cards to ensure customers can use them domestically, where most merchants have not deployed readers needed to accept chip cards.
EMV cards are considered more secure because they store payment information inside secure computer chips, making them more difficult to hack than a standard mag stripe.
“Providing our clients innovative products and services that they need to expand their business globally is a crucial priority for us,” Bruce Wallace, SVB Financial Group chief operations officer, said in a press release. “Chip-enabled cards provide a new level of security and convenience for our clients with international operations that need a holistic card program as a strategic component for their payables strategies.”
Most chip-based cards also require a user to enter a PIN to authorize a transaction, but Silicon Valley’s cards will require a signature. The company said beginning June 1 its clients may apply for the card, called the World Elite MasterCard for Business.
In April, JPMorgan Chase & Co. said it would begin offering in June a chip-and-signature version of its Palladium credit card, a Visa-branded product it issues to its high-end private and commercial banking clients (
Wells Fargo & Co. also in April announced it would offer both chip-and-PIN and chip-and-signature cards to travelers (
Forty percent of all payment cards and 71% of terminals worldwide are now compatible with the EMV specifications, according to EMVCo LLC, the United Kingdom-based company that manages the guidelines (
