Cards

Diebold Inc. on April 26 signed an agreement to manage ATMs owned by Zao Citibank, a subsidiary of Citibank Russia. The management deal follows Zao Citibank’s agreement to lease ATMs from Diebold.

MasterCard Worldwide absorbed a sharp downturn in U.S. consumer credit card purchase volume and total consumer credit card accounts in 2009 as the recession drove consumers to cut spending. But the company turned a healthy profit anyway, thanks to its success in other areas, including relatively strong international purchase volume.

Diebold Inc. April 27 reported lower first-quarter revenues, but executives say the North Canton, Ohio-based company is booking more orders for intelligent-deposit ATMs from regional and community banks that previously were reluctant to open their wallets.

A directive Visa issued last week should make it clear to online merchants that they are not allowed to offer consumers third-party offers without asking for their card information a second time, the card brand noted in an April 27 statement.

Fidelity National Information Services Inc. said that even though consumers are willing to use online person-to-person payments, banks have to be proactive in making the service visible.

Toronto-Dominion Bank's mobile banking application has been downloaded more than 100,000 times in the first 10 days since its release.

SEATTLE — Nacha is pushing forward with a program aimed at making online bill presentment less costly for banks to offer their customers.

Visa Inc. felt the effects of the global economic recession in 2009, as U.S. consumers transacted less on credit. But strong gains in Visa’s U.S. debit card volume during the year helped to offset the slowdown in credit card use, and the company’s overall profits soared.

The European Commission’s decision today to accept proposed commitments from Visa Europe on its multilateral interchange rate for intra-regional debit transactions in the European Economic Area illustrates the card association’s willingness to help advance the mission of the Single Euro Payments Area, albeit belatedly, some analysts believe.

Visa Inc. officials say they are displeased with a recent decision by Woolworths Ltd., Australia’s largest retailer, to process debit card transactions domestically and bypass the credit card network in a bid to save millions in fees, according to local news reports.

Fiserv Inc. plans to offer a same-day bill-payment service to banks by the second half of the year through a partnership with the Minneapolis-based funds-transfer company MoneyGram International Inc.

One payments company and four investor groups remain in the running for RBS WorldPay Inc., the merchant-services division of United Kingdom-based Royal Bank of Scotland, according to a source with knowledge of the process.

The installed base of ATMs in 18 Western European countries grew in 2009 despite deployment declines in the United Kingdom and Spain, Europe’s two largest ATM markets, Retail Banking Research, a London-based strategic-marketing firm, reported April 23.

Card fraud has slowed to a crawl at Las Vegas-based Clark County Credit Union and CIO Roy Holmstrom is wondering whether he should thank his card-fraud prevention system for the good news.

Illustrating it continues to be a strong leader in the marketplace, Meta Payment Systems had 22.7 million “active” prepaid debit cards in circulation as of the end of December, up 26.8% from 17.9 million a year earlier, according to PaymentsSource research. Active cards are those used within the previous 30 days.

The European Commission today agreed to accept proposed commitments from Visa Europe on its multilateral interchange rate for intra-regional, immediate debit transactions in the European Economic Area, according to Visa Europe. In exchange, the European Commission will end proceedings on Visa’s immediate debit interchange fees.

Hoping to wring more electronic transactions from the shrinking pool of paper checks, Nacha is rethinking its stance on converting business checks into automated clearing house payments.

Apple Inc. has the power to make mobile payments huge, but not quite in the way bankers hope.

The Single Euro Payments Area, an initiative the European banking industry launched in 2002 to link European Union and other euro-based countries’ separate national payment systems into a standardized system, remains a work in progress. And not everyone believes the European Payments Council, which is responsible for the initiative that has seen several delays already, can complete the task by December 2012, as the European Commission has proposed.

TazTag, a France-based contactless-product maker, will include a Near Field Communication chip inside its TazCard, a 3.5-inch wide touchscreen card, according to Inside Contactless, a France-based contactless-chip maker.