Credit

Mumbai-based ICICI Bank has stopped accepting and soliciting applications for credit cards, according to local media reports.

China’s Supreme People’s Court and the Supreme People’s Procuratorate announced this week a judicial interpretation that clarifies several laws related to credit card fraud. The announcement is part of the recent crackdown by China on card crimes (see story).

Dejavoo Systems has signed a distribution deal enabling Tasq Technology Inc. to resell Dejavoo products, the Syosset, N.Y.-based point-of-sale equipment maker announced today. Tasq is a Rocklin, Calif.-based POS-equipment distributor.

Euronet Worldwide Inc., which conducts about 75% of its operations outside the United States, last week reported fourth-quarter revenue of $285.6 million, up 11.7% from $255.7 million during the same period in 2008. Revenue for the year totaled $1.03 billion, down 1.9% from $1.05 billion in 2008.

Citing the first quarter as a good time for consumers to focus on organizing finances, MasterCard Worldwide has begun re-running a “Priceless” television advertisement launched a year ago to promote the card brand’s bill-pay services, Steve Carnevale, MasterCard vice president of U.S. commerce development, tells PaymentsSource.

Vivotech Inc. and Zapa Technology Ltd. have forged a partnership to manage mobile-based rewards and payments for merchants in Europe, the companies announced on Feb. 18.

The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency announced a formal enforcement agreement Thursday with Capital One Bank for unfair credit card closing practices between 2004 and 2006.

Despite the dimming prospects for the creation of an independent Consumer Financial Protection Agency, Elizabeth Warren isn't ready to consider alternatives.

U.S. banks may be dropping their resistance to one of the world's fastest-growing payment card security formats, despite the prospect of increased costs.

Several credit card issuers this month are taking more “positive, promotional” approaches to introducing new policies and billing-statement changes mandated by a federal law that goes into effect next week, according to new research by Corporate Insight, a New York-based market-research firm.

Despite a fourth quarter net loss Heartland Payment Systems Inc. attributes largely to breach-related expenses, the Princeton, N.J.-based payment processor sees “encouraging progress” in small and midsize merchant transaction-processing volume and same-store sales, Robert Carr, Heartland chairman and CEO, told analysts during a conference call this morning.

Despite concerns regarding credit card fraud, consumers who have experienced a problem generally give their card issuer’s response high marks, New York-based management consulting firm Auriemma Consulting Group concludes in its most recent Cardbeat report. Auriemma based its findings on the results of a survey it conducted in December involving 522 cardholders.

Fraudsters on the prowl for payment card data last year increasingly turned to the hospitality industry as a source for the valuable data, according to the Trustwave Global Security Report 2010 released yesterday.

Visa Inc. and Travelex Central Services Ltd. last week announced the launch of the Visa Money Transfer service in Australia.

A number of forecasters have predicted that the industrywide chargeoff rate will peak in the middle of this year or sooner. But it is likely to be a gradual and uneven turnaround.

Credit card issuers once are again filling consumers’ mailboxes with credit card offers after a tough year in 2009, though not nearly as much as before the economic downturn, reports Synovate Mail Monitor, a New York-based firm that tracks direct mail.

By 2015, consumers worldwide will spend about $119 billion on goods and services using their mobile phones, representing about 8% of the total e-commerce market, predicts ABIresearch. In the United States, mobile shopping rose 203% last year, to $1.2 billion from $396 million in 2008, the New York-based research firm says.

MTN Group is launching a mobile financial-services product for its more than 100 million telecommunication subscribers in Africa and the Middle East that uses Gemalto NV’s SIM-based security module, according to the France-based card vendor. The product will enable subscribers to check account balances and conduct such mobile services as funds transfers and payments.

Last Friday’s opening event for the Winter Olympic Games in Vancouver, British Columbia, garnered $5.2 million in total spending on Visa credit, debit and prepaid cards, a 46% increase from $3.57 million the same day a year earlier, event sponsor Visa Inc. says.

Processors, not ISOs, likely will handle many provisions of a law that takes effect next January requiring acquirers to report merchant credit and debit card transactions to the Internal Revenue Service, says Henry Helgeson, co-CEO of Merchant Warehouse Inc., a Boston-based ISO.