Payments

Suvidha Starnet Pvt. Ltd. will invest more than 5 billion rupees (US$113 million or 80 million euros) to expand the operations of its Beam mobile-wallet service, a sign of the growing confidence in India’s mobile-payments market.

Varying opinions exist on how quickly mobile payments will grow in the U.S., but payments executives generally believe the technology could become a mainstream option for purchasing goods and services within 36 months, new survey data suggest.

The smartphone market is maturing rapidly, but banks risk getting left behind because a growing number of users consider the channel to be unsafe for financial transactions.

USAA has already processed nearly $4 billion in mobile banking transactions in the two years it has offered its Deposit@Mobile smartphone app. The company is now expanding this service, which lets customers deposit checks by snapping pictures of them with their mobile device, to the iPad 2 and plotting a new wave of digital banking products.

Two-year-old mobile payment startup Dwolla has gone from zero to $1 million per day in transactions.

Riding the credit card industry’s wave of better results caused by the improving economy and fewer account defaults, American Express Co. said second-quarter net income for its U.S. card Services unit rose 28.9%, to $665 million from $516 million during the same period a year ago.

Buoyed by the fast uptake of smartphones and tablets in the country, First National Bank Ltd. says it has become the first financial institution in South Africa to offer a mobile-banking application to its customers.

Though contactless payments have long been advertised for their ease of use, recent trials have departed from that premise. Some banks are putting the focus back on simplicity — and making payments as easy as a flick of the wrist.

As the hype for widespread Near Field Communication-enabled mobile payments continues to heat up, eBay Inc.’s CEO doused some cold water on the concept, suggesting instead that large merchants will resist the unproven technology.

Mobile payments will surpass 141.1 million users worldwide this year, a 38.2% increase from 102.1 million users in 2010, according to Gartner estimates released July 21. Worldwide mobile payment sales volume is forecast to total $86.1 billion, up 75.9% from 2010 volume of $48.9 billion.

Giftango Corp. wants to give merchants a head start on the mobile-wallet age by placing two-dimensional barcodes on the back of their proprietary, closed-loop gift cards to enable consumers to convert the plastic to a digital format via a smartphone camera, among other capabilities.

The biggest trend in merchant acquiring this year is a concentration on developing and selling mobile card acceptance to micromerchants, a new report suggests.

Isis, the wireless carrier-led mobile-payments venture, just crossed off a relatively small but integral item on its to-do list in signing Visa Inc., American Express Co. and MasterCard Worldwide to its system.

Isis, the mobile carrier-led mobile payments venture that initially planned to compete against incumbent payment networks, now has formed relationships with them, it announced July 19.

U.S. Bancorp has increased its mobile-banking options for prepaid card customers.

Continuing efforts to get its Serve digital wallet into consumers’ hands, American Express Co. has signed a deal with Sprint Nextel to put the payments application on the Sprint Zone website, where Sprint customers go to manage their mobile-phone accounts, Amex announced July 18.

Citicorp’s net credit losses dropped 27% to $2.2 billion during the second quarter, driven by Citi-branded cards in North America, John Gerspach, Citi chief financial officer, told analysts during a Friday conference to discuss the quarter’s earnings.

WILMINGTON, N.C.-Two weeks following the Fed's final interchange ruling, CU attitudes toward the future of debit could be changing, shedding some of the doom and gloom predictions and now working to leverage what some believe could be one of the biggest opportunities to win new members in years.

BELLEVUE, Wash.-From shifting members to signature from PIN, to cutting rewards, or adding enhancements to attract new members, no clear-cut strategies are emerging as CUs make decisions to address debit programs post-Durbin.

FAIRHAVEN, Mass.-One CU believes that moving more debit transactions from PIN to signature will drive greater interchange revenue and has introduced a cash giveaway to get members to change their behavior.