BofA reported a decline of 1.8% in Year-on-Year (Y/Y) average U.S. bank credit card outstandings of $88.1 billion. Meanwhile, PDV for BofA’s U.S. bank credit cards jumped 3.9% Y/Y and 9.6% Q/Q to $53.6 billion. BofA noted its U.S. debit card PDV also increased 2.7% Y/Y and 5.5% Q/Q to $69.5 billion. Also, BofA benefited greatly in Q2/14 from record low delinquency and charge-offs in its U.S. bank credit card portfolio.
Western Union global payment services appointed Raj K. Agrawal Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer. Bringing to the role more than 20 years’ business experience, most recently as Western Union Executive Vice President and Interim Chief Financial Officer, Raj was President of Western Union Business Solutions from 2011 through 2013. Agrawal, joined Western Union in 2006 as Treasurer and also has served as Senior Vice President of Finance for Europe, Middle East, Africa and Asia Pacific. Prior to joining Western Union, Agrawal held senior financial roles at Deluxe Corporation and General Mills, and he began his career at General Motors and later the Chrysler Corporation. He holds an MBA from Columbia University.
Ingenico announced that its On-Guard application has been referenced as a validated Point-to-Point Encryption application by the PCI SSC. Whereas cardholder data protection is currently increasingly challenged, the On-Guard P2PE solution enables merchants to reduce their exposure to data breaches. It also restricts the scope of merchants’ PCI DSS certification to the payment terminal only, leading to drastic cost reductions in both security investment and certification expenses.The On-Guard P2PE solution is supported and certified across the complete range of Ingenico Smart Terminals, including mobile POS, and thus aligns with new security challenges and regulations for mobile devices.
ReD implemented its ReD Prism transaction monitoring and risk management solution for WEX corporate payment solutions. WEX first became a ReD customer in 2011, with a hosted version of the PRISM solution to underpin and enhance its extensive cards portfolio. WEX regularly updates its fraud protection resources as a critical component of helping businesses operate more efficiently, productively and with greater control over their operations. PRISM monitors over three million active accounts for WEX and has helped significantly reduce fraud losses since its implementation. PRISM has been regularly enhanced to ensure that it remains among the leading fraud prevention solutions for card issuers, acquirers and processors. The solution utilized by WEX includes a custom neural model, tailored to meet the specific needs of the fuel card sector.
Secure Trading and First Data announced a partnership to design an easy-to-use, general purpose reloadable prepaid offering combining the powerful compliance tools of their ST-1 solution and First Data’s PayLucky™ Solutions. They will deliver an offering compliant with New Jersey and Nevada regulations and enables players to deposit and withdraw money from their accounts with licensed online gambling operators. Since launching PayLucky™ Solutions for the legalized online and offline gambling and gaming industry, this is the first virtual prepaid card agreement that will bring simplicity and ease to operators and players. On completion of the ST-1 registration process that verifies new players’ identification and location, or when existing players seek to make deposits into their wagering accounts, they will be offered a fully integrated process to set up a PayLucky prepaid account, providing players access to instant funding.
Jack Henry & Associates announced the availability of jhaEnterprise Workflow™, the fully automated workflow solution that streamlines and standardizes financial institution-defined business processes involving multiple steps, individuals, groups, departments, and systems. jhaEnterprise Workflow supports virtually any process that can be performed with a series of consistent steps. It automatically routes assignments based on established credentials, permission levels, and staff availability while enforcing established approval processes. Automated workflow supports immediate updates to business processes which expedites the ability for financial institutions to respond to evolving regulatory requirements with the ability to immediately update impacted business processes. jhaEnterprise Workflow generates material operating efficiencies; reduces operating redundancies, costs, and risks; improves staff productivity; and reduces labor requirements.
American Express agrees to distribute MasterCard’s multi-currency Cash Passport card in South Africa. AmEx says the success of the first multi-currency Cash Passport, a co-branded card that AmEx launched with Absa in 2013, has paved the way for AmEx to make the Cash Passport product available through more outlets across South Africa this year. The MasterCard Cash Passport card can be preloaded with up to four currencies (U.S. Dollars, Pound Sterling, Australian Dollars and Euros) at once.
BBVA updates BBVA Wallet with cloud-based Visa NFC specifications. BBVA Wallet has more than 200,000 users and is already operating in Spain and will be extended to BBVA customers throughout its global footprint. The new Visa/BBVA solution will be rolled out to all customers this year.
Wirecard has been supporting the mobile phone brand BASE as it launches the mobile BASE Wallet with prepaid payment card on the market. The Walletcard is a digital Maestro card and when used with a mobile phone, this enables contactless payment via near field communication (NFC) at all MasterCard PayPass acceptance points worldwide. The payment card can be used immediately after registration via the BASE Wallet app, which also provides a real-time overview of all completed transactions and available credit. The top-up function is also conveniently integrated in the Wallet. Wirecard offers another MasterCard digital credit card for payment in online shops. The prepaid card is also available as a plastic card. This enables the use of POS terminals which are not yet equipped with NFC technology.
CardConnect payment processing announced the launch of the CardConnect Merchant Center, an online account for each of its 50,000 merchant customers to view and manage their transactions in real time. The CardConnect Merchant Center – available at no additional charge to all businesses that use CardConnect to process payments – mirrors what consumers receive through their online banking accounts. It offers reporting and reconciliation, transaction management, account alerts, scalability and flexibility.
The Payments Council (15 July 2014) announces the appointment of three new independent directors to its Board. Sarah Chambers, Christine Farnish CBE and Robert Lerwill bring a wide range of experience in consumer policy, financial services and regulation to the Board. They join Clare Spottiswoode CBE as one of the Board’s four independent directors. Sarah is an expert in regulation, competition and consumer policy. Christine has wide experience of financial services, public policy and regulation. Robert Lerwill is a chartered accountant. The Payments Council Board is made up of 15 voting directors, a voting independent chairman and an observer from the Bank of England. In addition to the independents, 11 directors are appointed by the industry to represent a cross section of the Payments Council membership.
HID Global announced that mBank has successfully deployed HID Global’s ActivID DisplayCard Tokens.The tokens provide mBank’s corporate banking customers with an advanced, multi-factor authentication solution to securely access their Internet and mobile banking accounts. Headquartered in Warsaw, Poland, mBank is amongst the pioneers for corporate banking services in the country. It was also recognized in 2013 by Efma and Accenture as “The Most Disruptive Innovation” for projects and initiatives in the retail financial services arena that radically change and redefine the way it does business. mBank was seeking a highly secure, convenient and innovative Internet and mobile banking authentication solution that was easy to deploy.