Credit

U.S. credit card delinquencies fell in December to the lowest level since September as five of the six biggest card lenders posted declines, Moody's Investors Service said.

RegaloCard, a Miami-based mobile-payments company, has added two retailers–Universo Cellular in El Salvador and Cemaco in Guatemala–to its mobile funds-transfer network.

Users of China Mobile in Shanghai can now use their mobile phones to pay for their Metro transportation fares, according to a statement from the country’s largest telecom operator. The service will allow users to make payments at the turnstiles using mobile phones equipped to support contactless technology.

South Korea-based card company BC Card plans soon to begin expanding where its card are accepted overseas after inking a deal with Discover Financial Service to share credit card networks (see story) , according to a BC Card statement. The move will enable BC Card holders to use their domestic cards in other countries, including the United States, Japan and Singapore the statement notes.

Rooms To Go Inc., a furniture retailer, has made more room in its chain of 130 stores for TD Retail Card Services.

Store cards have dodged a bullet.

Remote capture services have become an important offering for business customers, and banks are now adapting the technology for mobile phones in an effort to reach the mainstream.

Card-fraud costs the U.S. payments industry, including issuers, merchants and acquirers, an estimated $8.6 billion per year, according to a recent report from Aite Group LLC, a Boston-based consulting firm. However, fraud amounts to only 0.4% of the estimated $2.1 trillion in U.S. card volume annually, according to the report “Card Fraud in the United States: The Case for Encryption.” Aite interviewed more than 30 fraud-management professionals for the report.

Credit card issuers are scrambling to add new software-based consumer income-estimation tools to their account-approval processes following the Federal Reserve Board’s release last week of the final rules implementing the Credit Card Accountability, Responsibility and Disclosure Act.

HSBC Holdings PLC’s rollout in the Asia-Pacific region of smart credit cards equipped with the EMV antifraud standard likely will help to increase the pace of EMV adoption this year in most markets, except the U.S., observers say .

U.S. Bancorp has hired Total System Services Inc. to provide card-processing services for its consumer-directed health care benefit cards.

Chinese online-shopping Web site Taobao.com has inked a deal with the Bank of China and Alipay.com to launch a cobranded credit card, an official from Alipay, a third-party payments provider, tells PaymentsSource.

India’s plans to have a domestic card-payment system will take another three years to roll out, an official from the National Payments Corp. of India tells PaymentsSource.

Banks in India will have to pay National Financial Switch 1 rupee (2 U.S. cents or 1.5 euro cents) for every ATM transaction they route through the network, an official at the Reserve Bank of India tells PaymentsSource. The Institute of Development and Research in Banking Technology, a subsidiary of the Reserve Bank of India, had waived the previous 2 rupee switch fee in 2007 to reduce ATM charges.

Australians in November spent AU$20 billion (US$18.1 billion or 12.1 billion euros) using credit and charge cards, up 13.6% from AU$17.6 billion during the same month in 2008, data from the Reserve Bank of Australia show. They initiated 133.7 million transactions during the month, up 14.5% from 116.8 million.

Cardtronics Inc. has appointed Steven A. Rathgaber CEO, replacing Jack M. Antonini, who left last year. Rathgaber previously was president and chief operating officer of NYCE Payments Network LLC.

The U.S. Supreme Court has signaled interest in hearing arguments from a JPMorgan Chase & Co. unit in a fight over the notice credit card companies must give customers before imposing an interest rate increase, reports Bloomberg News.

Under an agreement with Korean payments network BC Card, Discover Financial Service is enabling BC Card holders to use the Discover, Diners Club International and Pulse networks for international purchases and cash access outside of Korea, Discover announced yesterday.

The 5,000 merchant locations and more than 50 independent sales organizations Payment Alliance International acquired from Comdata Processing Systems already have transitioned to using Payment Alliance’s products and services, says Donna Embry, senior vice president of Louisville, Ky.-based Payment Alliance.

Sino Payments Inc., a U.S.-based payments processor that operates out of Hong Kong, says it has signed its first agreement with a European acquirer, Valitor. Under the deal, European merchants will be able to use Sino Payments to process online and card-present transactions.