Payments

LOS ANGELES – Law enforcement agents believe hundreds of thousands of dollars being withdrawn from ATMs in California are related to the data breach announced recently by Michaels Stores.

The twin effects of lenders keeping a tight rein on credit card lines and consumers borrowing less with cards in April drove the average card-account default rate down to levels not seen since February 2009, according data Fitch Ratings released Friday.

Gift and loyalty services company SparkBase LLC is using $3 million in new funding to hasten the development and deployment of its technology platform and mobile services, which includes a smartphone application that enables consumers to quickly enroll in merchant-loyalty programs.

NEW ORLEANS–For all talk about how mobile technology can rapidly bring financial services to emerging markets, it has really only worked in a few countries so far, most notably Kenya and the Philippines. Much of mobile money’s success in Kenya can be attributed to the work of Michael Joseph, a strategic advisor to Safaricom, who discussed here on June 7 his experiences building a new financial infrastructure in that country.

Bharti Airtel Telecom Co. has signed a memorandum of understanding with Pan-African banking group Ecobank Transnational Inc. to provide mobile-banking services across Africa, the companies announced June 7.

Visa Inc.’s acquisition of Fundamo will help it use mobile payments to serve more underbanked consumers abroad, according to the card network, which on June 9 announced a deal in which is will pay about $110 million for the Cape Town, South Africa-based mobile payments company.

Think Computer Corp. has added a contactless-payment capability to its FaceCash mobile wallet.

NEW ORLEANS–One of the prevailing themes of this year’s Mobile Banking Summit is there is nothing inherently wrong with plastic cards: A number of speakers, panelists and attendees with a major stake in mobile payments all acknowledge that physical cards work well, posing a steep hill to climb to get consumers to use their phones to make payments.

WASHINGTON – Credit union lobbyists were licking their wounds yesterday after failing to get a delay in the Federal Reserve’s debit rule, but began work aimed at ensuring the exemption for credit unions and community banks is adequate.

Abu Dhabi Commercial Bank Ltd. last week announced a free mobile-payment service that will enable its customers to make small-ticket purchases at merchant locations within the United Arab Emirates.

Bling Nation, the mobile payments and loyalty company, has shut down its service in a move it insists is only temporary.

NEW ORLEANS — Banks intent on bringing mobile payments to a wide swath of customers will soon have to make difficult decisions about devices, partnerships, vendor management and employee training.

FLINT, Mich. – Financial Plus FCU said it has signed with CO-OP Credit for credit card transaction processing, in addition to the debit/ATM processing already provided to the $370 million credit union by CO-OP Financial Services.

WASHINGTON – The credit union and banking lobbies were pulling out all the stops last night to round up a few more votes for their bid to delay cuts in debit fees, but the effort was still a handful of votes short.

About 200 banks and credit unions are using Fiserv Inc.'s Mobile Money software, more than double the number that were live with the service a year ago, the Brookfield, Wis., vendor said June 6.

Mobile banking and payments provider Clairmail Inc. has hired a new chief financial officer and a new chief technology officer.

In a move backing its plan to showcase mobile payments at the London Summer Olympics and Paralympics Games in 2012, Visa Inc. says it will roll out a Near Field Communication-based mobile phone for payments linked to prepaid accounts from British bank Lloyds TSB.

EMerchants Ltd. on May 20 won a three-year contract to provide prepaid cards for Telechoice, the largest dealer for mobile operator Optus Ltd. in Australia.

Mitek Systems said June 6 it has been granted four new patents from the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office for its popular “Point, Shoot and Deposit” mobile deposit technology.

Google Inc. isn't asking for a share of the payments revenue generated with its new mobile wallet. Nevertheless, partnering with the search engine juggernaut could be a trade-off for banks.