Open discussion
On December, 26th, the Protocol of cooperation between Association of the Russian banks (ARB) and Association of Russian members of EUROPAY (REMA) has been signing in Moscow. The Protocol specifies close cooperation between ARB and REMA in their activity for development of cashless payments.
Expert RA rating agencyand the National Agency for Financial Studies (NAFI)) presented data of their joint research project «Market of bank deposits: modern state and consumer preferences».
According to Alexander Turbanov, Director General of Deposit Insurance Agency (DIA), DIA has allocated 71 billion rubles for readjustment of Russian problem banks. 6.4 billion rubles out of the above sum are a part of the 200 billion rubles allocated to DIA from the federal budget for expansion of its functions (alongside with the deposit insurance function DIA got the powers for readjustment of the problem banks). The money came to DIA account at the end of November, 2008.
The financial companies of Great Britain – issuers of credit cards, have signed a new code, which forbids them to raise their interest rates sharply.
On December 12, 2008, Supreme Rada of Ukraine adopted law №3343 «On amendments to certain acts of Ukraine (concerning prohibition for banks to change unilaterally the terms of bank deposit and credit contracts)».
According to TransUnion.com agency, in the third quarter of 2008, the volume of debts on credit cards in the USA grew by 6 % in comparison with 2007, and by 1.6 % in comparison with the second quarter of 2008, and on average amounted to 5 710 US dollars. A nonpayment coefficient on at least one card account increased by 5.8 % in annual terms. In the third quarter the level of non-payments grew by 1.1 % compared with the same period of 2007 and by 4.8 % in comparison with the previous period.
According to a forecast of ComNews Research Company, in the 4th quarter of 2008, the global financial crisis will slow down the gain growth rates of the cellular telecom companies in Russia and CIS countries. A major factor of the changing growth dynamics will be not a decrease in the consumption of services, but «washing out» of the operators’ incomes.
An original protection against ATM swindlers was invented in Japan. According to Japanese Yomiuri Shimbun, the country’s police begin an experiment with installation of systems for suppression of GSM- and CDMA-signals in ATMs installed in streets, railway stations and airports. Due to the cellular «suppressors» the banks and police hope to make useless the equipment for interception and transmission of financial data of the cardholders to malefactors.
In January-November, 2008, the total amount of the deposits of physical persons in the Belarus banks (including money of non-residents, savings certificates and bonds) increased by almost 2.8 trillion Br (1.3 million US dollars), or by 25.7 %, and at the beginning of December exceeded 13.6 trillion Br (6.2 million US dollars).
Lanit Company announced transformation of its subdivision for outsourcing of IT services into a separate legal person with a brand name of Onlanta.
As Evgeny Korolev, Deputy Chairman of the Board of SBERBANK of Russia, said to mass-media, in November, 2008, the inflow of deposits of the physical persons in SBERBANK of Russia amounted to 11.8 billion rubles. In the first 8 days of December, 2008, alone, the inflow reached 18.5 billion rubles.
The National Agency for Financial Studies (NAFI) has published the results of a research, dedicated to the people’s attitude to a non-return of the bank credits.
According to the analytical report «Russian banks: love weakens every day», made by Bank «Renaissance Capital», only 30 largest banks of the Russian Federation will avoid serious problems in 2009, while for the others «merge and absorption will be vital». Experts from «Renaissance Capital», believe that with account of the recalled licenses the number of credit and financial establishments in Russia can be reduced by 200-250 banks; at that, in 2009, only 5 state banks will grow at advanced rates, and 25 other biggest banks will demonstrate growth of their assets at an average market level.
A high risk of credit losses has forced the National Bank of Ukraine, the Ministry of Finance and the country’s banks to elaborate a plan of joint actions for re-structuring of the borrowers’ debts. If the participants of the credit market agree with the terms of a corresponding memorandum, NBU will be able to lower the capital adequacy norm, while the Ministry of Finance will provide tax rebates to those banks, which sign the memorandum.
On December 8, 2008, the National Reserve Bank (NRB) announced its decision to introduce a moratorium on payment of penalties or higher rates under the credits for the borrowers - physical persons.
At the international round table «National payment system, e-cash and bank cards: legal regulation» Anatoly Aksakov, President of Association «Russia», emphasized that a national payment system should be formed in a complex, with a simultaneous elimination of contradictions in the Russian legislation, in compliance with the international standards, and with account of the interstate integration.
In the opinion of Lubov Slobodeniuk, Executive Director of CreditSvit Company( Kiev), the point of no-return of mortgage credits can be expected in the spring of 2009. This risk, she believes, is due to the fact that 82 % of all the credits are in dollars, and lately grivna has depreciated by 30 %.
As Alma Obayeva, Deputy Director of Department of Settlement Regulation of the Central Bank of the Russian Federation, said at the conference «Mobile commerce 2008», the Bank of Russia and the Ministry of Finance of the Russian Federation were working on a bill which, probably, would also concern the non-banking operators accepting payments. The bill «On the national payment system» will be presented to the government of the Russian Federation in 2009.
According to information from the National Bank of Ukraine (NBU), an analysis of liquidity of the Ukrainian banking system testifies that the measures taken by NBU to counter the crisis phenomena in the banking system reduced the rates of the daily money outflow from the banks, and ensured solvency and timeliness of settlements in the banking system as a whole.
By mid November, 2008, over 50 thousand American cardholders had a credit card debt exceeding 900 US dollars. Many of these debts are impossible to collect due a pitiable economic situation of the debtors, therefore the debts should be written-off or bankruptcy procedures started.
The National Bank of Belarus is working on the project of creation of a uniform payment information environment. The given system is expected to be introduced in 2009.
Participants of Adam Smith Russian Banking Forum held in London, believe that 20 % of the Russian banks can become victims of the global financial crisis.
According to Merrill Lynch, ruble will continue to fall, but already in 2010 it will return to the rate of 25.9 rubles/ $, if the state aid to the economy is efficient enough and oil prices restore.
Within the framework of the monitoring project «Trust to financial institutions, appeal of the financial instruments: indexes and ratings», the National Agency for Financial Studies (NAFI) presents ratings of reliability and transparency of the financial institutions given by investors and borrowers.
InformZaschita Company Group and OKB SAPR Company, Russian producer of information security hardware, have announced their merger.
On December 4, 2008, the European Central Bank and Bank of England considerably lowered their base interest rates, when recent week negative macroeconomic data proved that the economic recession would be deeper and longer, than previously thought, informs Associated Press.
Ilham Aliyev, President of Azerbaijan, has signed the Decree on additions to the «List of activities, which require special permission (license) and the sum of a State Tax, established for obtaining of a special permission (license) for these kinds of activity», approved by Decree №782 of September 2, 2002, on improvement of the rules of granting of a special permission (license) for certain kinds of activity.
With reference to the press release of Prostobank-Consulting, Interfax Agency informs that Ukrainian mortgage market is practically completely paralyzed. Today credits for purchase of housing in new buildings are not provided by any of the country’s 50 largest banks, whereas acquisition of secondary housing is credited by only 2 banks – an affiliated bank of SBERBANK of Russia and Brokbusinessbank.
A wave of unauthorized microtransactions has recently overflowed the American credit cardholders. Its scale and the reasons behind it are still not identified.
In 2009, the Russian insurers may face up to 50 % reduction of the volumes of collected insurance premiums and a similar reduction of the number of players. The companies, which have invested big money in retail, will have to reconsider radically the terms of its recoupment, and those, who specialized exclusively in autoinsurance, will have to think, how to survive.
Sales of consumer goods in 15 states of the Eurozone compared with the past 2007, dropped by 2.1 %. In October, 2008, the sales decreased by 0.8 % in comparison with September. The recession appears to be more serious, than analysts predicted.
The Russian authorities consider feasibility of allocation of 300 billion rubles (equivalent of 10.7 billion US dollars) to ensure state guarantees for the banks’ credits. Alexey Kudrin, Minister of Finance of the Russian Federation, announced that at the meeting on economic questions at Dmitry Medvedev, President of Russia.
MDM-Bank and URSA Bank announced decision of their shareholders to integrate their shares into a bank holding, which would result in creation of the largest private full service bank in Russia. This integration will ensure for both banks even a more advantageous position for implementation of their long-term development plans.
The next increase of the state deposit guarantees can amount to 300 thousand rubles. As a result, the sum total of the guarantees on bank deposits will reach 1 million rubles. For an estimation of the effect of a possible increase of the deposit insurance, the Central Bank of the Russian Federation and DIA have already requested new-form reports from the banks.
Recon International Publishing House informs its readers that an online access to the information concerning the companies and other structures presented in the annual Russian-English Directory PLUS-Eurasia Buyers Guide 2008–2009 is open in the information portal www.plusworld.ru in section www.plusworld.ru/eurasia.
With nearly 20,000 visitors, CARTES & IDentification has affirmed
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On December 1, 2008, Anatoly Aksakov, President of the Association of Regional Banks, made a presentation in London, at a plenary session of the traditional annual forum «Russian Banking Sector», organized by Adam Smith Institute.
Deposit Insurance Agency (DIА) has published the updated information on the banks to be subjected to readjustment.
PLUS Journal announces expansion of its PLUS-daily on-line news project in the information portal www.plusworld.ru (its English language version is www.plusworld.org). Now we publish news at the moment when events are still happening!
According to the National Bureau of Credit Histories (NBCH), the number of the banks’ requests for credit histories has halved. Thus, if in September, 2008, the Russian banks requested credit histories 1.98 million times, in October this number decreased to 1.104 millions. This testifies to a shrinking volume of crediting.
In the period of November, 1- 25, 2008, the net outflow of deposits from the Russian banking system lessened, and did not exceed 0.5 %. The parameter appeared to be considerably less than in October, when the outflow from the domestic credit and financial establishments was in the country on average equal to 6 % of private persons’ deposits, or 300-350 billion rubles. Citizens withdrew from their accounts mostly rubles and because of fears of a possible devaluation of the national currency, converted them into dollars and euros. At that, practically nobody opened new accounts.
Within the framework of the collective policy aimed to counter the cyber crimes the EU countries intend to create a Common Cyber Attack Alarm System. Europol, global European police, will receive about 300 thousand euros for development of Internet crime information system.
ING Group Bank ( Amsterdam, the Netherlands) and MasterCard Worldwide plan to undertake testing of mobile payments in Romania. Nokia 6212 mobile phones with NFC technology will be distributed among 500 consumers, who at the first stage of tests will be able to make payments in 30 shops in Bucharest.
Jose Manuel Barroso, head of Eurocommission, has suggested forming «a humanitarian rescue package» for poor countries in the conditions of the financial crisis.
At a meeting with journalists in Rostov-on-Don, Herman Gref, Chairman of the Board of SBERBANK of Russia, said that the bank would consider a possibility to delay payments of credits for the citizens who had lost their jobs. «We are thinking about this now. A decision is necessary, and I believe that in near future we shall prepare it», he said.
Registration of cyrillic domains in «.рф» zone will be possible for regular users by the end of 2009.
Before the end of 2008, the Ministry of Economic Development of the Russian Federation plans to present to the government of the Russian Federation a bill of bankruptcy of physical persons. The bill offers to the citizens, unable to pay off their debts, a procedure of bankruptcy, allowing them to pay their debts in installments in a period up to five years.
According to British The Times, in November, Abbey National Bank belonging to Spanish Santander, raised the rate on some cards from 16.9 % up to 19.9 %. This week HBOS increased the money transfer commission from 3 % up to 3.5 %.
Nokia announced termination of sales of its mobile phones in Japan, except for Vertu brand. The decision was taken, when the company failed to occupy any serious position in that market.
The House of Representatives of the National Assembly of Belarus approved the president’s decree, which fully guarantees compensations for deposits in the Belarus banks.
The member states of the international organization ALBA (Bolivarian Alternative for the Americas) agreed to create a uniform currency zone.
Hypercom Corporation will supply POS terminals Optimum T4200, accepting contactless payments, within the framework of a pilot project implemented in Australia on the basis of NFC technology.
The Eurocommission has presented a plan for stimulation of the EU economy, envisaging financial injections at a rate of 200 billion euros. This sum is equal to 1.5 % of the total gross national product of the EU countries. As expected, these measures will help to save millions of jobs.
Deposit Insurance Agency(DIA) begins to pay insurance compensations to the depositors of MSB Bank, Mira-Bank and Econatsbank. Compensations for the accounts will be paid to each depositor at the rate of 100 % of the whole sum of the bank accounts, but no more than 700 thousand rubles in aggregate. For the bank accounts in foreign currencies insurance indemnity will be paid in rubles at the rate of the Bank of Russia as of November 12, 2008. The sums not compensated by the insurance, will be paid off during liquidation of the bank.
On December 2, 2008, in Hyatt Regency Hotel, company SilverKey Technologies-Azerbaijan, representing the American company SilverKey Technologies in Azerbaijan, will present GoldenPay, the first in Azerbaijan system of Internet payments.
Ministry of Communications and Transport of Ukraine plans to introduce the system of a single electronic ticket for all kinds of transport, before the end of 2009.
According to Anti-Phishing Alliance of China (APAC), by the beginning of the 4th quarter of 2008, 300 domain names belonging to phishing sites were abolished in «.CN», Chinese national Internet segment.
The above statement is proved by the results of evaluation of the economic mood indexes in big and medium cities done by the Strategic Research Center of Rosgosstrakh in October-November, 2008.
During the SCR – 2008 exhibition held in Moscow, November 18-19, 2008, Artem Каzarian, Head of Sales Department of PSTCompany, presented report «Multivendor after-sales service of a bank’s acquiring network». The topic of the report was not selected by chance, since due to the situation evolving in the financial market the banks face an acute question of optimization of their costs and hence of the structure of their service subdivisions.
Credit cards are the banks’ most profitable products. However, lawyers say that by raising the prices of the credits that have already been provided to the borrowers, the bankers risk to face judicial claims from their clients. Nevertheless, the banks still raise the interest rates on the provided card credits.
The government of the USA announced allocation of additional 800 billion dollars for support of the national economy.
In the State Border Committee of Belarus, Major General Igor Rachkovsky, Head of the Committee, met Chu Кu Kho, Immigration Service Commissioner of the Ministry of Justice of the Republic of Korea.
According to estimates of Symantec Company, this year, the Internet swindlers, specializing in various bank card operations will make 5.3 billion US dollars. This figure has been obtained due to extrapolation of the data on the number of the issued bank cards and the fraud volumes in concrete spheres of Internet.
In his address to the parliament concerning the plan to overcome the economic crisis in the country, Alastair Darling, Chancellor of the Exchequer of Great Britain, said that the world had not seen such instability in many decades.
Reg Varney, the comic actor, who played the cheerful bus driver in the British TV comedy «On the Buses», died on November 16, 2008, at the age of 92.
Vasily Vdonin, Chairman of the Board of Directors of Tarkhany Regional Bank ( Penza), informed that the bank can be incorporated into the structure of the Russian Agricultural Bank before the end of 2008. According to V. Vdonin, the negotiations can come to the end successfully already in the coming few days.
The banks will increase the volumes of financing of small business enterprises due to public funds. The small business will get rates not above 11 %, while the banks will get state guarantees.
Today's financial crisis is a fait accompli, and now the situation is sliding from a financial crisis into an economic one. In the opinion of Anatoly Aksakov, President of the Association of Regional Banks of Russia, the real problems are still ahead.
State corporation Deposit Insurance Agency (DIA) informs, that recently it has revealed numerous cases, when credit organizations, shortly before their licenses were recalled by the Bank of Russia, made illegal banking transactions for an artificial formation of «contributions» to the accounts of the physical persons in order to get (or increase) their insurance compensations.
The association of GSM operators calls upon the manufacturers to equip all their new models of phones with NFC technology by mid 2009.
In its annual report to the Congress, the US Congress Commission on American-Chinese Relations in the Sphere of Economy and Security, warns that China intensifies its computer espionage against the US government and American companies, and gains a growing access to secret information through the American computer networks. The document also states that the Peoples’ Republic of China aggressively uses cyber methods in order to achieve superiority over the USA in any conflict.
The government of India has launched a new scheme of health services for the 60 million citizens living below the poverty line. Each such family will get a card, which provides a medical insurance within the limits of 800 US dollars a year.
On November 6, 2008, the Board of the National Association of Participants of Electronic Trade (NAPET) formed in the structure of the Association a committee on electronic tickets. The sphere of competence of the committee includes legislative, technological and practical questions of application of electronic ticket technologies in railway, automobile and air transport, and in cultural-entertainment establishments.
Huge sums of money allocated for stabilization of the financial system, do not reach the regions, and are misappropriated by big players of a federal scale. Thus thousands of Russian businessmen engaged in small and medium business have not received any federal aid.
A lot of unresolved problems, including problems of a criminal character, have accumulated in the sphere of consumer crediting, especially in several recent years, characterized by its very high development rates (over 100 % in certain years).
In October, 2008, consumer prices in the USA dropped by a record value of 1 %, in comparison with the previous month.
According to Sergey Ignatyev, Chairman of the Central Bank of the Russian Federation, as of November 1, 2008, the volume of the gold and currency reserves of the Russian Federation was equal to 484.6 billion US dollars. He also said that in September-October of the current year the Bank of Russia allocated 57.5 billion dollars for support of the ruble exchange rate.
NVision Group announced that it had acquired the status of Qualified Security Assessors (QSA) and would begin to provide certified audit services for compliance of information systems with PCI DSS, international standard of information security in payment card industry.
In recent weeks PLUS has published a number of articles reflecting various experts’ views on the reasons and consequences of the world economic crisis. Today we present one of the most competent and interesting analytical publications on this theme by Maxim Pravdin, Doctor of Economics.
As PLUS-daily informed on November 12, 2008, the Federal Antimonopoly Service has elaborated a draft decision on the admissible terms of agreements between insurers and banks, and presented it to the government.
According to news agency Bloomberg, the world's four largest insurance companies can acquire small banks in order to improve their chances for getting money from the US federal program for rescuing of the banking system.
On November 18-19, 2008, Recon International Publishing House presented the printed version of its annual bilingual (Russian-English) PLUS-Eurasia Buyers Guide 2008–2009 in Hotel Kosmos Moscow at the 11th two-day Moscow international forum on payment cards in Russia and the 13th international conference and exhibition Smart Cards of Russia-2008 (SCR-2008).
The Fifth International CRM Congress focused on the strategy and technological development of client-oriented companies was held in Hotel Renaissance Moscow, October 21-22, 2008. The event was organized by Exposystems Company. The platinum sponsor of the congress was Microsoft. The status of the gold sponsors got companies Amdocs, Oracle and Jet Infosystems. The information partner of the event was PLUS Journal.
Doubtfulness, inopportuneness, and even a potential threat to the real prospects of the Russian economy’s withdrawal from the crisis of the bill «On amendments to the Federal Law «On banks and banking activity» find their reflection in a consolidated position of the Association of Russian Banks and Association «Russia».
Bank of Russia does not object to participation of the law enforcement bodies in control over the banks’ currency transactions. As Sergey Ignatyev, Chairman of the Bank of Russia, said at a briefing in the Government of the Russian Federation: «In this situation, characterized by a significant capital outflow, a more effective and rigid supervision is required».
According to Mikhail Sukhov, head of department of licensing and financial rehabilitation of the credit organizations of the Central Bank of the Russian Federation, when adopted, the bill setting higher requirements to the size of the banks’ capital will not result in essential reduction of their number.
A single center for coordination of mobile commerce will be established in Russia with the functions of standardization and internal regulation of the Russian market of mobile commerce.
As Dmitry Medvedev, President of Russia, said at a meeting with the management of the Chamber of Commerce and Industry, the Central Bank of the Russian Federation should see to it that the banks’ credit rates must not exceed the reasonable limits. He also acknowledged that the credit interests in Russia were considerably higher, than in other countries.
SMS banking is rapidly gaining popularity with the cardholders of Belarusbank: the number of its users has exceeded 300 000.
The results of the activity of the Russian insurance companies in the nine months of 2008, summed up by the Federal Service for Insurance Supervision (Rosstrakhnadzor), demonstrate that the financial crisis and the subsequent curtailment of real business retard the growth rates of the insurance premiums. Thus, already today a return to the schemes on minimization of taxes is noticeable.
According to experts, Russian authorities will stop the banks’ attempts to make money on the currency exchange differences, using the means of the state support allocated for maintaining the stability of the Russian banking system and continuation of crediting of the real sector of the economy.
MasterCard announced the financial results of its activity in the third quarter of 2008 in the European region. The number of cards of the payment system (MasterCard, Maestro or Cirrus) issued in the region reached a 500 million level.
Results of a poll of the First Rating System Company ( Ukraine) have shown that 25 % of the inhabitants of Ukrainian big cities use Internet shops.
At the recent governmental meeting on economic questions held on November 10, 2008, the main topic for discussion was the measures undertaken by the Government to alleviate the consequences of the world financial crisis, in particular, the federal support for the Russian banks. Vladimir Putin noted, that recently the credit institutions had increased the volume of the funds transferred to foreign banks, and emphasized the necessity of an appropriate control over the means allocated by the Government.
On November 11, 2008, a package of bills on consumer crediting was introduced in the State Duma of the Russian Federation, according to which the banks will be forbidden to change freely the rates on the already provided credits.
As of October 1, 2008, the number of cards issued by SBERBANK of Russia increased compared with the beginning of 2008 by 19.7 % and reached 27.9 millions.
URALSIB Bank announced a launch of a large-scale federal program of social advertising with the aim to increase the financial literacy of the population. The campaign, supported by the Ministry of Finance of the Russian Federation, will be carried out this autumn in 32 key cities of Russia, and will familiarize the citizens of the Russian Federation with simple rules, which can help each Russian family to feel more confident in today's market situation and to avoid the unnecessary stresses and mistakes.
The US Federal Reserve System has satisfied the request of American Express, one of the largest international payment systems, concerning the change of its legal status. Following the example of the investment banks Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley, AmEx also decided to get the status of a bank holding, which entitles it for federal support.
The Federal Antimonopoly Service (FAS) of the Russian Federation intends before November, 15, 2008, to present to the Government a draft decision on the admissible terms of agreements between the insurers and the banks concerning all kinds of crediting, except mortgage.
On November 7, 2008, five Moscow branches of SBERBANK of Russia began to provide credits to private clients with the use of a new technology based on a centralized assessment of borrowers.
PandaLabs experts warn about the established direct interconnection between the volatility of the stock exchanges and the growing number of new Internet threats.
Dmitry Medvedev, President of the Russian Federation, signed the Federal Law «On additional measures for strengthening stability of the banking system in the period up to December 31, 2011». The law was approved by the State Duma and the Council of the Federation, and came into force at the moment of its official publication (on October 28, 2008).
On October 30, 2008, under the presidency of Sergey Ignatyev, Head of the Central Bank of the Russian Federation, a meeting of the Board of Directors of the state corporation Deposit Insurance Agency (DIA) was held.
On the initiative of Russia the First Committee of the General Assembly of the United Nations adopted the resolution «Achievements in the sphere of information and telecommunications in the context of the international security», 167 states voted in favor of it, the US delegation voted against it, and nobody abstained.
Cisco Company has published the second report on the results of a global research of the data leakage in the corporate information networks.
NCR Corporation has received orders for approximately 6 thousand ATMs from the leading five Chinese commercial banks (Agricultural Bank of China, Bank of China, Bank of Communications, China Construction Bank, and Industrial & Commercial Bank of China).
Within the framework of the initiative to evaluate the quality of the work of the post services of the Middle East countries, Qatar Post Corporation announced introduction of RFID-technology from Motorola Inc. RFID readers produced by Motorola and technologies from other suppliers became a part of the tests in a joint project with the companies Emirates Post and Saudi Post.
As Alexey Simanovsky, Director of the Banks’ Regulation and Supervision Department of the Central Bank of the Russian Federation, said at the parliamentary hearings in the State Duma of the Russian Federation on October 28, 2008, the banks should create a fund or a system of collective financial security similar to the deposit insurance fund.
Alexey Abramov, Director of the Department for Organizing of Deposit Insurance (АСВ), said to mass-media that the agency refused to compensate for the accounts formed during «fictitious» transactions and transfer of the funds of legal persons to people’s accounts.
According to the report of Kaspersky Lab on the spam activity in the third quarter of 2008, the share of spam in the global mail traffic reached 80.5 %, which is 2 % less than in the second quarter of the current year.
According to the National Police Agency (NPA), in August of 2008, the number of ATM frauds dropped to its lowest level in 17 months – less than 1 000 cases.
NEC Company ( Tokyo, Japan) has developed an algorithm of a biometric identification of persons by their face images. The given biometric system is based on 32-bit NEC V850 microcontroller. The developers managed to reach a high speed of the instrument: the applied algorithm allows to identify 300 persons per second.
Members of the British Parliament and experts of the UK credit market expressed their indignation of an unreasonably high annual interest rate (over 222 %) offered by Argos trading company on Easy Shop credit card, and intended for the borrowers, wishing to get credits for payment of purchases from 100 up to 500 euros.
According to the results of a research of Western Union Company, with the beginning of a holiday season during the period of economic uncertainty, when consumers everywhere are compelled to limit their budgets, 56 % of Americans prefer cash as a gift.
In the beginning of September, 2008, the project United ATM Network of Uniastrum Bank and Rosbank has started, including more than 2.3 thousand АТМs across all Russia.
According to the message of the newspaper "Businessman", the government of Russia recommended VTB and Savings Bank to finance grocery networks of the country.
According to the report of APACS, the Internet-swindlers and spamers exploit the global financial crisis and crash of the bank system. In the Europe, according to APACS, the quantity of fishing attacks on banks has grown on 180% during 9 months. Brands of banks JP Morgan Chase, Wachovia and Bank of America are used by fraudsters more often than other brands.
According to the Azerbaijan association of microfinancing (ААМ), within the last 10 years, the volume of the microcredits given by nonbank credit organizations and commercial banks of the country to representatives of small and average business, has made US$1.18 billion.
The biggest players in the Russian mortgage market introduce protecting tariffs on provision of credits.
On October 7, 2008, over 700 thousand Mexican citizens could not use their credit cards for payment of purchases. Experts explain the banks’ measure by a drastic (almost 6 %) fall of the Mexican stock exchange, collapse of the Mexican peso (increase since August, 2008, of the exchange rate of the US dollar from 9.6 up to 13 Mexican pesos), and a sharp decline of the oil prices.
Ebay Inc., owner of the Internet auction of the same brand, announced a 10 % staff reduction because of decreasing sales and strengthening competition.
According to The Yomiuri Shimbun ( Osaka, Japan), the government of the Peoples’ Republic of China intends to introduce a new system of imported goods’ certification, forcing the manufacturers to provide the initial information on the products, which is an object of intellectual property.
CONTACT money transfer and payments system has summed up the results of its activity in the first half of 2008.
According to forecasts of Tsifrograd Company, one of the leading cellular retailers, in 2009, despite the financial crisis, the cellular retail market can grow by 24 %. These conclusions are based on the information obtained in the polls done in the Russian Federation by the research holding ROMIR, and also on the open access data.
The Ukrainian Tax Administrationintends to control the market of self-service payment terminals. In particular, in the opinion of the administration, the users of the devices should get payment receipts, while the owners of the terminals, in their turn, should get licenses, without which their activity will be considered illegal.
According to the Association for Payment Clearing Services of Great Britain (APACS), in the first half of 2008, the sum of the bank clients’ damage caused by Internet swindlers’ attacks grew by 185 %, mainly due to the increasing phishing attacks and spy frauds.
According to Guardian, Computer Controlled Methadone Dispensing System (CCMDS) began to operate in the penitentiary establishments in Great Britain.
According to the manufacturers of antiviruses, in near future, the vendors’ refusal to participate in the testing of VirusBulletin (VB100) anti-virus solutions, which are technically rather obsolete and inadequate for determination of antivirus quality, can acquire a mass character.
Experts in Krasnodar insurance market believe that due to the currently unstable financial situation the insurance market will grow by 15–20 %.
According to Sergey Logvinenko, CEO of the Ural Branch of Renaissance Insurance Group, the crisis in the Russian financial market has not yet affected the insurers’ basic activity. However, if the bank crediting market declines, the volume of sales of the insurance products through the banking channels will decrease sharply. Besides, in 2008, because of the problems on the exchange market, the profitability of investments, which is an important part of the insurance companies’ profits, will be lower than was preciously expected.
From October 10, 2008, tariffs for credits on Visa Absolut cards of Absolut Bank will be raised from the present 16 % up to 20 %. In general, the interest rates on the bank’s credit card products have been raised, on the average, by 3-4 %.
Experts from the Federal Antimonopoly Service (FAS) have presented an updated version of the decision, which determines possibility of conclusion of agreements between banks and insurers.
IVK-Systemshas installed in Sitronics Smart Technology Company (Zelenograd) the most modern full-function complex for manufacture and personification of plastic cards – MX6000 from Datacard.
In the past 8 months of 2008 the October Railway has sold over 116.8 thousand tickets through Internet.
As Vladimir Gamza, First Vice-President of the Association of Regional Banks of Russia, said at the Fraud in Banking Sector Conference, already in 2008, the number of computer information-connected crimes (for example, write-offs from clients’ accounts) can reach a 10 thousand level (compared with 3 520 such crimes registered in 2007).
Discussion of the bill «On the activity of accepting payments from physical persons carried out by payment agents» scheduled for September 19, 2008, was removed from the agenda on the request of Deputy Pavel Medvedev.
In Yamal-Nenets Autonomous Area a new kind of fraud has been registered, involving MOBI.Money Internet payment system.
Deposit Insurance Agency(DIA) can raise the insurance compensations on bank deposits from the existing level of 400 thousand rubles up to 700-800 thousand rubles.
NAIRIT, public noncommercial association, has carried out a sociological research to evaluate the efficiency of the state policy of the Russian Federation in the sphere of innovations.
By the results of an independent research of RBC-Rating and moneyguide.ru, as of July 1, 2008, Alfa-Bank was the second (after SBERBANK of the Russian Federation) by the number of its plastic cards in circulation.
Community of five cellular telecom operators in Europe and North America integrated with the purpose to establish common global standards and rules in the field of on-line payments.
On September 16, 2008, the People's Bank of China lowered the annual credit rate by 27 basis points, up to 7.2 %.
L-1 Identify Solutions Company ( Canada) has presented its new ID system – VisionAccess 3D Face Reader.
The Bank of Russia does not see any necessity to introduce restrictions on transborder capital transactions, said Sergey Ignatyev, Head of the Central Bank.
According to the Ministry of Finance of the Russian Federation, SBERBANK of the Russian Federation, VTB and Gazprombank will be offered money from the federal budget for three- and over month deposits.
KIT FinanceInvestment Bank managed to avoid bankruptcy. On September 17, 2008, the bank, which owes about 10 billion rubles to its counterparts, received financial support from VTB and Gazprombank. Besides, within the next few days the control packet of shares of KIT Financewill be sold to management company Leader.
Experimental on-line voting will be held in one of the districts of Novomoskovsk, Tula Region.
On September 18, 2008, the National Banking Council (NBC) intends to consider at its meeting the project «Main Guidelines of the Uniform State Monetary-credit Policy for 2009 and the Period of 2010-2011».
In mid-September, 2008, SBERBANK commenced cooperation with collection agencies.
Within the framework of Spoken Web project a research laboratory of IBM Corporation is developing a system of voice access to the network resources.
Retica Systems Company (Waltham, Massachusetts) concluded a contract with the US Army on development and testing of Eagle-Eyes, new ID system allowing recognition by an iris, face and video series.
Of all the value-added services (VAS) in the Russian market the micropayment segment is one of the youngest and less significant. According to experts’ estimates, in 2007 the share of mobile payments in VAS market compared with 2006 increased from 4 % up to 12 %.
The Federal Antimonopoly Service (FAS) announced the list of criteria, which all insurance companies should meet, if they are to cooperate with banks. According to FAS, the rules will streamline interaction of the financial structures and do a lot of good to borrowers-insurants.
GlobalRating Announces Placement of the Best Part of Its Reports in the Information Portal of PLUS Journal www.plusworld.ru
In spite of the fact that the plans concerning transition of the state bodies to electronic document circulation were announced 6 years ago, no progress is observed in the given question so far.
On September 19, 2008, State Duma will have the first reading of the bill «On the activity of accepting payments from the physical persons by payment agents».
CFT Company has taken measures to neutralize the earlier reported series of DDoS-attacks and on September 11 restored access to Faktura.ru system.
At a meeting on development of the Russian electronic industry scheduled for late September – early October, 2008, a complex of measures will be presented to vice-premier Igor Sechin, which will allow Russia to become a world’s microelectronics leader by 2010.
Sitronics has announced creation of a joint venture Sitronics-ZTE Ltd. with ZTE Corporation ( China). The authorized capital of the new joint venture is 1 million US dollars. Thus, Sitronics will have the control package of shares (51 %) of the enterprise.
According to Global Payments (USA), one the world's largest processing companies, United Investments, controlled by KM Invest, investment foundation, has agreed to sell shares of UCS (UnitedCardService), one of the largest Russian processing companies. The value of the transaction is 120 million dollars. Global Payments intends to get part of the money for it from the current credit line.
The Public Chamber of the Russian Federation has examined the draft federal law «On the activity for accepting of payments from physical persons, carried out by payment agents» and draft federal law «On amendments to separate acts of the Russian Federation in connection with adoption of the Federal law «On the activity for accepting of payments from physical persons, carried out by payment agents».
Boris Miroshnikov, general-colonel of militia, head of the Bureau of Special Technical Actions of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, said in his interview to the Russian Newspaper that with the growing volume of the electronic financial turnover the number of crimes in this sphere also increases. In the first half of 2008 alone 420 criminal cases were commenced against electronic swindlers, whereas in the similar period of 2007 there were only 222 such cases.
Office of Fair Trading (OFT), Great Britain, a part of the Department of Trade and Industry of the country (DTI), threatens to submit the case of incomes of the British banks made on private persons’ current accounts to the Competition Commission, if the credit and financial establishments do not justify the existing system of commissions and do not change their attitude to consumers’ interests.
According to the results of a research published by Gemius Company, specializing in online research, in July, 2008, Runet’ audience amounted to 25.6 million people.
РћРўP Bank (Moscow) and Oranta Insurance Company have concluded a contract in accordance with which the insurance company accepts the bank’s insurance risks involved in transportation of the collected cash.
Security Standards Council PCI announced detailed information concerning the forthcoming changes in PCI DSS standard.
On September 9, 2008, during a press conference attended by the heads of MasterCard Worldwide, the first transaction on MasterCard PayPass card in the territory of Russia was announced. A purchase was made with MasterCard PayPass card within a demonstration of contactless payments at Moscow Five Stars restaurant of Prime Star chain, incorporated into the acquiring network of Expobank (Barclays Group).
Federal Antimonopoly Service of the Russian Federation (FAS) has made a list of the banks suspected of using latent commissions in crediting of physical persons.
According to Sergey Dubkov, member of the Board of Directors of the National Bank of the Republic of Belarus (NBRB), the NBRB Board came to a decision that banks should present to the NBRB bureaus of credit histories the data on all the provided credits, notwithstanding their size, within 10 days from the date of granting of a credit. So far the banks of the country presented to NBRB information only on the credits, which exceeded an equivalent of10 thousand US dollars.
British company Barclaycard has started mass issue of credit cards on the basis of contactless technology. The company plans to issue over 1 million contactless credit cards already by the end of 2008.
Wincor Nixdorf International GmbH announced termination of its relations with Inpas Company concerning supply of equipment, solutions, and also service and software support for products of Wincor Nixdorf in the territory of the Russian Federation. The above decision comes into force on 31.12.2008.
On September 9, 2008, during a press conference attended by the heads of MasterCard Worldwide, the first transaction on MasterCard PayPass card in the territory of Russia was announced. A purchase was made with MasterCard PayPass card within a demonstration of contactless payments at Moscow Five Stars restaurant of Prime Star chain, incorporated into the acquiring network of Expobank.
The official press release of Inpas Company September, 09, 2008, Moscow
Dear Sirs,
Herein we inform you that starting from October 10, 2008, Inpas Company has to discontinue delivery of equipment from Wincor Nixdorf Company to the Russian market.
CyberPlat Internet payment system and Western Union transfer system have provided to Russians possibility to pay for the services of the three leading Russian mobile operators – Beeline, MTS and MegaFon – in any of over 170 thousand branches of Western Union in 150 countries of the world, where Quick Pay service is available.
Societe Nationale des Chemins de fer Francais (SNCF), national company of the French railways, launches a pilot project for payment of railway services by means of USB tickets. The aim of the project is to transfer all SNCF clients to a contactless payment system. About 1 000 volunteers, who will participate in the project, will get special devices looking like USB flash cards.
On August 31, 2008, when withdrawing cash from an ATM in Kiev, an employee of the Clearing Center Branch of PrivatBank discovered skimming overlays on an ATM keyboard and card-reader slot. He informed about that the bank’s security service, then dismantled the skimming equipment himself and handed it in to the law enforcement bodies. Criminal proceeding were commenced on the fraud case.
The Federal Antimonopoly Service (FAS) has developed recommendations for banks concerning selection of partners from among the insurers.
Bank of Moscow has started implementation of electronic Pupils’ Card project in a number of Moscow schools.
On September 3, 2008, the Central Bank of Russia and Financial Supervision Agencyof Estonia signed a memorandum of mutual understanding. The supervision bodies intend to exchange information concerning the state and development of the national banking sectors, the basic requirements of the national legislations in the field of banking supervision, and also major changes in them.
According to a forecast of Juniper Research, by 2013 the world’s volume of mobile transfers will exceed 5 billion US dollars, internal and transborder transactions included.
Visa Inc. payment system expands the geography of its Visa Money Transfer program. Today among the program’s 13 countries-participants are France, Greece, India, Kazakhstan, Malaysia, Russia, Sweden, Switzerland, etc.
Banks of Estonia warn their clients, that today, in a view of the deteriorating economic situation in the country it would be extremely unreasonable to take SMS credits in order to pay other debts.
ARMO-Systems, Russian distributor of access control equipment and devices, presented in the Russian market new biometric terminals and readers from ZKSoftware Company ( China) intended for use in the monitoring and access control systems and in the working time accounting systems.
John Daugman, D. Sc., from Cambridge University (UK), in his interview to Business Weekly ( New York) predicted rapid progress for iris based ID technologies.
American company MoneyGram International has acquired MoneyCard World Express and Cambios Sol, two money transfercompanies affiliated with its Spanish network.
SBERBANK of Russia announced that since the beginning of 2008 it had doubled the number of its self-service devices for transactions with foreign currency cash up to 500 pieces.
In its letter № 03-04-06-01/255 the Ministry of Finance of the Russian Federation established a new accounting procedure for the companies, which provide exchange, sale and purchase services involving electronic accounting units among clients with the use of a payment system complex (Internet payment systems).
On November 25, the UK Border Agency (UKBA), Home Office, will begin to issue biometric ID cards to the foreign citizens, who plan to stay in the United Kingdom for a long time.
According to IT security experts, in recent several days some 100 domains have been registered, connected with the hurricane Gustav, threatening the US coast. Most of them are projects of Internet swindlers organized allegedly to collect donations for the people, who suffered from the hurricane.
According to the forecast of analysts from Frost and Sullivan research agency, by the end of 2012, the number of cellular telecom subscribers in the developing markets of Asia-Pacific Region (РђPR) will increase by 573 million people.
According to the Bank of Russia, out of more than 111 million bank cards issued in the territory of the Russian Federation, more than half appeared to be «sleeping».
Visa Inc. announced its transition to a new version of contactless payment technology – Visa Contactless 2.0, which will promote popularity of Visa payWave system all over the world.
SBERBANK of Russia 2008 has announced the results of promotion of bank cards in the first half of 2008. As of July 1, 2008, the number of cards issued in the given period grew by 12.3 %, and reached the level of 26.2 million.
Subdivision of the German post service DHL and retail network METRO Group have launched the largest pilot RFID project in France.
UK Biometrics Company ( Newcastle, Great Britain) concluded an agreement to the sum of 500 million pounds on delivery of Fingerprint Entry security systems – biometric access control devices analyzing fingerprints, to Busy Bees Company.
Cordoba Financial Group, Islamic commercial finance company, issued the first MasterCard credit card in Great Britain corresponding to the requirements of Sharia.
The Financial Times with reference to British Insurance, the largest Internet insurance company, informed that the British insurers refuse to insure bankers against unemployment. The insurers, who continue to provide insurance policies to bank employees, toughen the terms of the contracts or sharply raise the price of insurance. Thus, in past July alone such insurance premiums grew by 200%.
I.T. Company announced that it had been granted the status of the exclusive partner of the world manufacturer of ERP-systems with the open initial code – Compiere Company (California, USA). I.T. Company concluded with Complect Company (Island of Sakhalin) its first contract on introduction of ERP-system in the Russian market. A commercial operation of ERP-system is expected to begin in 2009.
According to ABI Research, in 2008 – 2013 the volume of the world biometric market will increase from 3 billion US dollars up to 7.3 billion dollars. Biometric technology experts believe that in the beginning of the current decade the interest in biometrics was instigated by a new wave of terrorism. However, today biometric technologies offer many more opportunities.
The US National Institute of Standards and Technologies (NIST) has finished its regular annual research of the voice identification technologies. By its results, the first place was awarded to the technology developed by the Singapore Institute of Information-Communication Research (I2R).
Fundtech, developer of banking software, (USA) offers to its clients a wireless access to their corporate cash management systems. Fundtech has integrated its Cashplus cash managementplatform with a mobile commerce technology from Firethorn, affiliate of Qualcomm, American manufacturer of software for wireless systems.
Because of a low banks’ demand for the credit histories of their clients, credit history bureaus (CHB) try to make money on additional services. One of the market’s leading participants, the National Credit History Bureau (NCHB), offers to financial institutions its own borrowers’ evaluation aimed to decrease the number of bad debts.
The Philippine e-commerce companies got opportunity to enter the Chinese market, when they started accepting ChinaUnionPay debit cards. The cards’ transactions will be processed by the Philippine processor Mozcom PayEasy.
Early in September, 2008, the order of the Federal Financial Markets Service (FFMS) will come into force, simplifying the interaction of banks and mortgage agents. The new document will allow to avoid situations, when banks lose credits’ interest payments during preparation of securitization transactions.
Before the end of 2008 the Russian banks will obliged to use cash registers for implementation of cash payments. The Bank of Russia is elaborating the corresponding normative documents.
Romir research holding has undertaken a research among active Internet-users to find out how often they use Internet-shops and how much they spend there. During the research over 1.3 thousand persons in the age group of 18 years and over were polled across Russia.
The People's Bank of China has authorized Citibank to issue Yuan-denominated debit cards to its retail customers in China. Citi says it will process Chinese debit card transactions in association with Chinese bankcard processor China Union Pay Data Services. The bank expects to be in a position to launch debit cards in the near future, pending final preparations.
Up to 300,000 Mongolians will be reached by a new cellphone banking service to be launched by Mongolian microfinance firm XacBank. The Consultative Group to Assist the Poor (CGAP ), a Washington, DC-based microfinance body, is supporting XacBank with technical assistance and funding.
According to Xinhua News Agency, in near future the government of Peru will start to apply biometric identification technologies for the country’s boundary control. This initiative was announced at the summit of high ranking representatives of the member countries of Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC), held in Lima, the capital of Peru.
According to the Federal State Statistics Service, in the first half of 2008 the real incomes of the population grew by 8.1 % in comparison with the respective period of 2007, while in June, 2008, the nominal per capita incomes reached the level of 15.6 thousand rbl. a month, which is almost 25 % more, than in the previous year.
Russian Mortgage Bank (RMB) is the first among the participants of the mortgage market to offer credits without insurance of clients’ life and ability to work. According to RMB administration, now a borrower can get a mortgage credit including only mortgage insurance.
A survey of European corporate treasurers by Experian Payments has found that 32 percent are concerned about a possible rise in direct debit fraud following the introduction of SEPA-compliant cross-border direct debits. Direct debits involve a biller setting up a mandate to take regular, automated payments from a customer’s bank account.
The Ministry of Finance informed the Ministry of Internal Affairs that the system of payments through instant payment terminals was as legitimate, as payments via the banks. According to Vladislav Reznik, Chairman of the State Duma Committee on the Financial Market, he was notified about this by Sergey Shatalov, Deputy Minister of Finance.
According to a forecast of Gartner analytical agency, in 2008 the world’s information technology costs will grow by 8 % and reach 3.4 billion US dollars.
However with account of the US currency’s volatility, in the current year the increase of IT costs in real terms will make only 4.5 %.
On August 19, 2008, in their joint statement the National Bank of Georgia and Financial Supervision Agency of the country canceled all the restrictions concerning provision of commercial credits and credit card transaction processing by the banks.
PayPal online payment system has notified its sellers about the necessity to inform the internal revenue service of the USA about the total amount of payments made by PayPal users in the United States.
UK fraud data for the first half of 2008 indicates that the rise in UK account takeover fraud seen in 2007 is indicative of a continuing trend, rather than just a temporary phenomenon. The data was compiled by UK fraud prevention service CIFAS from information supplied by the 270 financial institutions which are its members.
Till recent time the development of domestic market of credit cards was practically uncontrolled – various estimates of the credit card turnover in Russia differ in several times.
According to Visa payment system, in the first day of the Olympic Games in Beijing alone the turnover on Visa credit, debit and prepaid cards of the sportsmen and tourists exceeded 10 million US dollars.
According to the National Bank of Ukraine (NBU), in the first half of 2008, the number of transactions carried out with the payment cards issued in the country, equaled 311.5 million, which is 62.6 million (or 25 %) more than in the respective period of the previous year.
Web security firm Symantec is warning of a new type of online scam. It says Internet users need to beware of rogue anti-spyware messages that pop up when they are online. These messages, which Symantec refers to as “misleading applications,” tell Internet users that their PC is infected with a new type of security threat. They may also offer to make the user’s computer perform faster and more efficiently.
Alfa-Bank is authorized to organize financing of the project for production of polycrystalline silicon in Russia to be implemented by Nitol Solar company.
The situation with provision of SMS-credits in Estonia now acquires a political coloring, since some of the citizens, who had taken advantage the given service, suffer significant financial losses.
Slovenia's Activa System and the Slovenian Association of the Blind and Visually Impaired have launched a portable smart card reader to help visually impaired customers bank and shop securely online.
OSMP, the largest domestic network of payment terminals, part of OE Investments, presents QIWI Russian payment service in the 29th Olympic Games in Beijing.
Since August 11, 2008, Russian Post accepts people’s donations across Russia for inhabitants of South Ossetia, who became victims the Georgian military invasion. Everybody can make a donation to the single account opened by the Ministry of Labor and Social Development of the Republic of North Ossetia–Alania.
On August 12, 1998, CyberPlat electronic payment system made its first online transaction – replenishment of a subscriber account of Beeline cellular telecom operator. In the past 10 years this business has developed into a socially significant sector of the financial market with a multi-billion turnover.
E-port Group, organizer of the payment system of the same name, has summed up the results of its activity in the first half of 2008.
Financial Action Task Force on Money Laundering (FATF), an international group for counteraction against money laundering, recommends to toughen control over the non-bank financial institutions supervised by FFMS, Rosstrakhnadzor and Rossvyaz.
Russian Insurance Traditions Insurance
Company has concluded an agreement with Transcapitalbank on
implementation of Joint Payment Project. Within the framework of the
given project the bank will provide the clients of the insurance
company with free-of-charge Visa Electron bank cards, to which, at
clients’ will, insurance premiums can be transferred.
Nico van Staveren, a gas station
operator from Holland, has invented a unique robot to fuel
automobiles, dubbed «Tankpitstop».
Level Four, an open standards-based ATM software vendor, has published a 'Guide to the ATM and the Payment Services Directive (PSD)'.
The PCI Security Standards Council, which manages the Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (DSS), PCI PIN Entry Device (PED) Security Requirements and the Payment Application Data Security Standard (PA-DSS), has added two new payment industry device types to the PED program.
Visa Inc. has published its financial results of the third quarter of 2008.
According to General Accepted Accounting Principles (GAAP), in the third quarter the net profit amounted to 422 million US dollars, or 0.51 dollars per one class A common share. According to GAAP, there were 776 million such shares in circulation.
Thousands of migrant construction workers in Dubai are now using ATMs
for the first time to withdraw their salaries. The workers are issued
with payroll cards by C3 Card, a Dubai-based prepaid card firm.
MasterCard-branded cards, which are issued in association with
Commercial Bank International, function as both prepaid debit and ATM
cards.
Following Trend Micro Company, Dr. Web Company also refused to pass the August test of VirusBulletin100 (VB100) anti-virus programs organized by an authoritative British magazine with the same name. It is the first time a Russian anti-virus producer refuses to pass VB100 test.
On August 5, 2008, the Ukrainian Regulation «On e-cash in Ukraine» approved by the Decision of the National Bank of Ukraine (NBU) № 178 of 25.06.2008, came into force. According to the norms of the new document, in Ukraine e-cash can be emitted only by banks.
MTS Company became the first Russian cellular telecom operator to introduce an instant online-payment service with use of bank cards on its web-site. MTS launched this service with its technical partners VTB24 Bank and ChronoPay operator of Internet payments.
VympelCom Company (the trade mark of Beeline) has passed an audit for compliance with the requirements of PCI DSS standard. This step will allow the company to create its own payment gateway and accept bank cards via Internet. As is known, today the company holds a tender for selection of a bank-acquirer.
40 % of shares of Elecsnet Company belonging to Mint Capital venture fund are now on sale. The investor negotiates a deal with a number of potential buyers, and also considers a possibility of the company’s IPO.
Late in July, 2008, to order of Motorola Inc. a technological poll was done of the enterprises in the sphere of passenger transport, industrial production, freight traffic and warehousing of goods in North America. The poll revealed that introduction of technical solutions with GPS function increases individual labor productivity and production efficiency due to lower annual labor and fuel costs.
The beginning of 2008 was marked by a launch of an updated website of the United Payment System NCC|UC (www.ncc-uc.ru). The new version of the website presents maximum of information useful for the holders of cards of NCC, Union Card and Visa payment systems and also for the existing and potential participants of the United Payment System NCC|UC.
The eighteenth appeal arbitration court has recognized the fact of collusion between the UniCredit Bank (previously known as International Moscow Bank) and 15 insurance companies.
The League of Insurance Organizations of Ukraine (LIOU) expresses its concern over the situation, which has emerged in the relations between the banks and insurance companies in Ukraine.
PayPal marked its 10th anniversary by publishing a report on the impact of the Internet on consumer shopping. PayPal says that 150 million accounts in 190 markets use PayPal services to pay and get paid.
UNIStream, international money transfer system, has signed a partner agreement with bank Manas (Kyrgyzstan)
The Russian financial markets are recognized as «partially meeting» the requirements of FATF (Financial Action Task Force, group involved in development of financial measures against money-laundering).
Specialists from Infosec Company, which has the status of Qualified Security Assessor, finished the audit of VympelCom cellular telecom operator (trade mark of Beeline) for compliance with the PCI DSS security standard.
At the beginning of July 2008 «Eskhata Bank» (Khujand, Republic of Tajikistan) terminated the first stage of banking informational complex CFT-Bank (Oracle-based development platform) implementation.
Global financial institution CitiGroup Inc. announced US$2.5 bln. losses in II quarter 2008.
Muhlbauer, a one-stop-shop technology partner for security solutions
covering the complete TECURITY market, provides an innovative
contactless UHF chip encoding technology, available already for all of
its card personalization solutions.
Alfa-Bank reduced interest rates on mortgage program «Acquisition of a flat on secondary market with down payment of 10%» for Moscow and Sochi.
Gemalto has issued over 1 million Internet banking smart card readers to UK customers of Barclays Bank. The smart carders, which are marketed as PINsentry by Barclays, offer strong authentication for online banking when used in conjunction with the customer’s Barclays chip-and-PIN debit card.
BPC’s SmartVista solution, a comprehensive, state-of-the-art family of closely integrated software applications for transaction processing and card management received a “Strong Positive” rating in the leading analytical report “MarketScope for Multiregional Card Management Software, 2008” fulfilled by Gartner Inc. in July 2008.
Office of Fair Trading (OFT) got hundreds of complaints from British banks' clients, who demand to refund fees deducted by banks for forbidden overdraft.
Now Visa Int. takes active measures to proper respond to fuel prices rise. The nearest plans of the payment system include processing development and reducing interchange fees at U.S. gas stations.
The triumphal procession of the plastic cards continues furthermore in
a rapid speed. Bank cards, identification cards, health cards, telco
cards, loyalty cards, etc. are not to be excluded in the today’s world
any more. Due to this enormous mass above all banks, but also the other
companies, which want to send plastic cards and other similar products
as for example paper cards on postal way to their customers or
prospective customers must think about more efficient solutions to the
sending.
To the beginning of July 2008 the number of mobile subscribers in Uzbekistan exceeded 9 mln.
According to The Banker’s survey, bank HSBC topped the list of major world banks. In 2007 HSBC ranked the third place in this list.
CROC Company terminated the project of automatization the work of IT-infrastructure exploitation services of TREL-Invest Company.
To the middle of July 2008 the number of cards issued by West-Ural SBERBANK exceeded 1 mln.
European banks and mobile operators have reached an agreement to develop the use of mobile handsets for NFC (near field communication handsets) payments. The agreement is between two trade associations, the European Payments Council (EPC),which represents 8,000 European banks, and the GSM Association (GSMA), which represents 750 GSM operators across the globe. The two associations have agreed to set up a Trusted Services Manager (TSM) organization to facilitate the development of mobile payments.
Global mobile provider Vodafone acquired 70% stake in Ghana Telecom, a leading telecommunications operator in Ghana (Africa). The total consideration is US$900 million.
Infosec Company offered free access to PCI DSS documentation in Russian on its web-site. The translation was made by certified auditors with wide practical experience in audit and scanning according to PCI DSS standard.
According to financial comparison Website website MoneyExpert.com, fees for the British tourists withdrawing cash in ATMs abroad, are kept on the level to 4 %.
According to the results of the interactive interrogation spent on the SKB-bank’s site (Ekaterinburg), the majority of Russians use ATMs, and even more often cardholders use cash dispenses not only for cash withdrawal. 326 persons have taken part in the interrogation.
Company Ingenico has got 55 % of Fujian Landi's share capital, one of the leading Chinese transaction solution provider and Point-of-Sale manufacturer. Under the terms of the transaction, the acquisition is paid in cash for a total amount of US$17.05 million.
Company Diebold has received the status of the exclusive supplier of cash dispenses to Bank of China which will use them for improvement of service Olympic Games 2008 visitors in Beijing.
Allied Bank (Pakistan) has signed the agreement on transactions processing with company First Data. Within the given contract First Data will give processing services for card portfolio of the Allied Bank on the basis of the own processing platform VisionPlus.
According to the research spent by request of Visa Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) in 17 countries of the region, in 2007 the volume of consumer-to-business e-commerce transactions rose by 40 % up to US$10,9 bln.
Anti-Malware.ru, the Russian independent information-analytical portal,
has published the next annual report «the Analysis of the market of
anti-virus protection in Russia 2007-2008».
One of leading vendors of voice verification solutions VoiceVault, and the company Experian have presented a new service for call-centres VoiceCheck. Within the limits of the given service, identification of subscribers is made by comparison of their voices to existing records available in a database.
A survey spent in February, 2008 by the company-developer of bank
software Fundtech (New Jersey, the USA) among 23 major European banks,
has shown high level of concern about the influence of the Single
European Payment Area (SEPA) on their profitability.
The Vietnam Bank Card Association (VBCA) has been compelled to suspend the implementation of the announced program in which frameworks since July, 2008 country banks began to keep a minimum fee of 1 000 Vietnam Dong (6 US cents) for all ATM transactions.
Rosselkhozbank has voluntarily informed the Federal Antimonopoly Service (FAS) on anticompetitive agreements with 19 insurance companies, and has refused these agreements. By the move, the bank has taken advantage of the program of the liability clearing of infringement of the antimonopoly law provided in the Code of the Russian Federation about administrative offences (CoAP of the Russian Federation).
Lufthansa Technik AG specializing in repair, re-equipment and servicing of civil aircraft, has chosen Motorola Company as supplier of the radio-frequency identification (RFID) systems for its logistics subdivision. The new system will incorporate portable MC9090-G RFID readers and stationary RFID XR480 readers manufactured by Motorola.
In May, 2008, swindlers’ use of skimming devices was for the first time officially recorded in the Latvian market. Thus, criminals illegally took the sum of 1 500 lats (3 386 US dollars) from the account of a Riga inhabitant. As is known, a day before the cardholder took some cash from Latvijas Krajbanka ATM, in which, as experts believe, a skimmer had been installed. However, the victim herself did not manage to noticed any suspicious devices in the ATM.
NXP Semiconductors announced that its STB100 T21 reference board is the first digital terrestrial system-level solution to have passed the NorDig 1.0.3 standard certification test.
NXP Semiconductors Company announced its Nexperia Cellular System PNX6910, the highest-speed broadband cellular program modem in the world. The PNX6910 solution based on an embedded vector processor (EVP) from NXP Company supports data transmission speeds up to 150 Mbit/sec in a reception mode and up to 50 Mbit/sec in a transmission mode, and also a multi-mode operation in LTE/HSPA/UMTS/EDGE/GPRS/GSM networks.
As of the end of June, 2008, the banks of the People’s Republic of China issued over 1.6 billion bank cards. Over 110 million or about 7 % of the total number were credit cards.
Late in June, 2008, specialists from Infosec Company, which has the status of Qualified Security Assessor, finished the audit of Bank «Saint Petersburg» for compliance with the PCI DSS security standard.
Trend Micro Incorporated announced its new complex corporate Trend Micro Threat Management Solution aimed to detect and neutralize organizations’ internal network threats. The solution is based on the infrastructure of Trend Micro Smart Protection Network. The developer of the new solution devoted special attention to the speediest neutralization of harmful software in order to minimize the risks for the corporate data.
SAS Company, one of the world’s leading providers of software and business-analytical services, announced expansion of its presence in the market of Kazakhstan. Within the framework of this initiative SAS took part in the international professional forum «IFRS Kazakhstan – 2008: Transition period and new opportunities for companies», which was held in Almaty on June 11, 2008.
During Ciab Febraban Exhibition held late in June, 2008, in Sao Paulo (Brazil), RSA Company (security subdivision of EMC) announced commencement of supplies of RSA SecurID 1100 flexible card-displays. The new card-display ensures a two-factor identification with one-time passwords (OTP). It was developed to protect bank accounts and online transactions.
A legal framework for negotiating interchange fees could be on the way, if the U.S Senate passes a bill introduced by Dick Durbin, Democratic Senator for Illinois.
Standard and Poor's (S&P) rating agency has recognized its mistakes in the system of evaluation of the companies’ debt instruments. S&P made this statement, when the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) finished its investigation of the rating agencies. The market participants accused the agencies of an incorrect evaluation of risks, which resulted in an overestimation of the mortgage bonds and a financial crisis.
According to Retail Banking Research (RBR), the rates of installation of ATMs in Western Europe are steadily increasing due to a high demand for sophisticated РђРўРњs and the growing markets in such countries as Turkey, Portugal and France.
According to the Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU), British analytical agency, despite the current financial instability, Latin America’s banking industry still attracts increased levels of investments.
By the results of an online research of people’s economic opinion undertaken by Nielsen Company in 51 countries of the world, despite the rising prices on foodstuffs and inflation, Russia became one of the ten most optimistic markets in the world, the leaders in the rating of consumer trust. The latter is counted on the basis of three parameters: consumers’ confidence in employment prospects, evaluation by the consumers of their personal finance, and their readiness to buy new goods.
Early in June, 2008, VeriFone Company reorganized its activity in the Region of Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA) and established two separate regional divisions in the given zone of responsibility. The first division will concentrate on the work in the countries of continental Europe, while another will work with Northern Europe, Middle East and Africa.
Financial Services Technology Consortium (FSTC, with the headquarters in New York, USA) has initiated studies of various models of mobile payment technologies. According to consortium’s representatives, the aim of the project is development of recommendations concerning an approach, which will facilitate introduction of an inter-operable infrastructures for mobile payments.
According to a forecast of British IMS Research, by 2012 there will be 900 million users of mobile banking and payment services.
Belgian companies Integri, Keyware and Clear2Pay, specializing in electronic payment software, have teamed up with scientific researchers for development of NFC-based innovative applications.
In the current uneasy economic situation, big Swedish banks, to which Estonia owes hundreds of millions EEK, begin to have doubts and want to get their credits back.
According to Febraban, the fact that an increasing number of the Brazilian consumers, who, notwithstanding their low incomes, actively open bank accounts, encourages growth of the country’s banking market.
Vahur Kraft, ex-head
of the Bank of Estonia, head of Nordea, Estonian affiliated bank, described the
current economic situation in Estonia as «declining» as
a result of «obviously rather hard, than soft landing».
On June 7, 2008, the People's Bank of China (the Central Bank of the country) announced in Beijing its decision to raise by one point its deductions to the reserve fund in yuan deposits of the financial institutions of the People’s Republic of China. This measure was prompted by the necessity to tighten control over the liquidity of the country’s banking system.
The bill «On the activity concerning acceptance of payments from the physical persons, carried out by payment agents», legalizing the activity of payment agents in acceptance and transfer of payments for the goods and services from population, and related amendments in banking and other legislation was presented for consideration in the State Duma of the Russian Federation.
On June 11, 2008, holding ITG (INLINE Technologies Group) held a press conference at which it announced the official results of its activity in the financial year of 2007. A briefing for journalists was attended by the heads of ten companies affiliated with the holding.
According to London-based Retail Banking Research, after several years
of massive growth, in 2008 the global interchange fees face a decline.
As a result of a poll of about 100 IT-directors, undertaken during Infosecurity Europe Exhibition in London, analysts from Secure Computing came to the following conclusion: at present internal (insider) threats are even more dangerous than hacker attacks. Thus, over 80 % of the respondents consider insider threats as their highest priority. And only 17 % of the polled experts believe that hackers are still the main hazard.
Gemalto Company and TIM (Telecom Italia Mobile), Italian cellular
telecom operator, within the framework of their recently signed
contract on cooperation have started implementation of the first
project for introduction of NFC (Near Field Communications) technology
for payment of municipal transportation services in Italy. The system
will allow TIM subscribers in Trento to pay public transport fare by
their mobile phones with special software installed in SIM cards.
On May 30, 2008, Mumbai-based Indian bank HDFC renewed its contract
with NCR Company to manage its fleet of 2000 ATMs located in 327 cities
of India. The bank has also placed an order for 300 new NCR ATMs.
According to a recently published statement of the Commission of the
European Communities, 15 out of 27 EU member countries do not meet the
European norms of countering money-laundering. Among them are Germany,
France, Belgium, Spain, Luxembourg, Malta, Czech Republic, Poland and
Sweden, which is considered the most advanced jural state in EU.
On June 9 2008, during opening of OneSmart Club annual session in Sochi, MasterCard Europe announced launch of a new service – MasterCard Account Payment@ATM/POS. Within its framework the holders of cards MasterCard Worldwide and Maestro issued by the Russian banks get opportunity to replenish their card accounts through ATMs with a cash-in function or through the terminals installed in bank branches.
The 15th Anniversary International Central Asian Telecommunications, Computer and Information Technologies Exhibition (KITEL 2008) was held in Atakent Exhibition Centre (Almaty, Kazakhstan), May 27-30, 2008.
A 19-year old girl from Kuressaare (Estonia), who repeatedly used SMS credits, ran into a debt of over 400,000 EEK (25,600 euros).
VeriFone Company has signed contracts for delivery of POS-terminals with two large North American chains of fast food restaurants.
According to the annual assembly of Smart Card Alliance and CTST Conference, held in Orlando (Florida, USA), May 12-15, the fast-growing rates of fraud involving skimming of magnetic strip payment cards and shift of responsibility contribute to migration of the Latin American banks to EMV standards.
Early in April, 2008, Charles Ray Fuller from Northern Texas (USA) was arrested for an attempt to cash a check for the sum of 360 billion US dollars.
At night of May 6-7, 2008, in Luunia (Estonia) unknown persons stole an ATM, which belonged to Hansapank (Tallinn) and contained about 280 thousand EEK (17.900 euros).
According to the U.S Government Accountability Office (GAO), U.S federal agencies accepted card payments for revenues totaling $27 billion during fiscal 2007.
According to forecasts of Guntise Ravise, President of Skonto bЕ«ve, Latvian construction company, by the end of 2008 a lot of cheap housing confiscated from credit defaulters can appear in the real estate market of Latvia.
According to representatives of the National Bank of Belarus, the bank is not ready to initiate integration of ATM networks of the commercial banks.
Police in London (Ontario, Canada) are warning local businesses to be on the lookout for tampered debit card PIN pads on their premises.
At last the Estonian government officials united in order to take under their control the companies, which provide SMS credits (see PLUS-daily of May 6, 2008).
According to the forecasts of representatives of the Latvian bank sector, in 2008 the profit increase of the Latvian banks will be considerably lower, than in 2007.
Tom Silinsh, the head of finance administration of Hansabanka, informed mass-media that in 2008 the banks’ profit will be affected by such factors, as growth of the interest rates of the banks’ investments in lats, and also credit losses. According to the forecasts of T. Silinsh, the current year, 2008, will be more difficult, but a long-term potential of the developing banking sector of Latvia, as that of all Baltic countries, is positive.
According to a remittance research done by the Multilateral Investment Fund (MIF) of Inter-American Development Bank (IADB), the number of Latin Americans, who send their money home from the USA on a regular basis is decreasing.
Joint payment system NCC|UC, Evrofinance Mosnarbank, and Chinese payment system China UnionPay have launched a joint project, the aim of which is to organize issue and servicing of China UnionPay cards in the territory of Russia.
According to Xinhua News Agency, late in March, 2008, two former employees of the Agricultural Bank Рѕf China, found guilty of one of the biggest thefts in the history of the country, were convicted and executed in China.
According to Forrester Research, introduction of mobile contactless payment systems based on NFC technology encounters serious barriers.
VeriFone Company has signed contracts with Senegalese companies Ferlo and Byte Tech, specializing in switching and electronic payments, on distribution of its terminals in all the countries of Western Africa Economic and Monetary Community (UEMOA), and also in Cameroon.
According to Bloomberg, with reference to the report of the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), the world banks have included over 35 billion dollars of their write-offs connected with the global financial crisis in their balance reports, instead of in the reports on profits and losses, thus «having hidden» them from the financial regulators. That means, that a liquidation of the credit and financial sector’s losses will require not 81 billion US dollars, as it was believed earlier, but almost a 100 % more – about 116 billion dollars.
The world exhibition of digital security solutions and smart-card technologies will be held in Parisian exhibition center Paris-Nord Villepinte, November 4-6, 2008.
Monitise, London-based world’s developer and supplier of solutions for mobile commerce, plans to launch a mobile banking system and a payment platform in eight East-African countries.
In the first quarter of 2008 the volume of bad debts in five largest state commercial banks of China was 1.1 trillion yuans (158 billion dollars), or 1.88 % less than in the first quarter of 2007. The share of bad debts in these banks equaled to 91 % of the national volume.
Igor Rachkovsky, Chairman of the State Boundary Committee of the Republic of Belarus, said at a press conference in Minsk that introduction of automated boundary control system (РђBCS) in all the operating check points of the Belarus state border had been completed. The project was launched on January 1, 2008.
A representative of the Bank of China informed mass-media that the bank had developed and started introduction of certain measures, which will help to improve the services for the guests of the Beijing Olympics.
According to the Security Standards Council (PCI), the next version of the of information security standard PCI DSS will be available in October, 2008. The new Version 1.2 will be based on a feedback and real world data about the results of the project, provided by the organizations-participants of the Council.
Today, at 16.00 Moscow time, MasterCard Europe plans to announce in its official press release that Andrey Korolev, now holding the post of the Head of MasterCard Europe Moscow Office, will leave the post. His last working day will be May 30, 2008.
After an 18-month investigation the US Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) has ordered Wachovia Bank (Philadelphia, USA) to compensate the damage caused to the consumers as a result of its cooperation with a number of third party telemarkers and payment processors. The declared sum of compensation is 125 million US dollars.
Virus monitoring service of Dr. Web Company warns that a mass dispatch of letters addressed to the users of the «Schoolmates» social network contains reference to an infected site, which can damage the users’ computers.
Shanghai company SmartPay Jieyin in partnerships with Unicom, China Unionpay and Huishang Bank has launched a Mobile-Wallet service in the province of Anhui (People’s Republic of China) for paying of utility bills. This service allows the users to pay bills any time and anywhere using their cellular telephones
According to the report of the European ATM Security Team (EAST), in 2007 ATM fraud losses rose by 43 % in Europe and amounted to 439.01 million euros (683.7 million US dollars), compared with about 306.48 million euros in 2006.
The Committee of the State Duma of the Russian Federation on Budget and Taxes approved the bill canceling the necessity of the use of control-cash technologies (CCT) by the small business payers of the uniform imputed earnings tax introduced in the State Duma of Russia on September 21, 2007.
AK-Invest Group financed by the state corporation Vnesheconombank has acquired Altis, French microelectronics producer, from IBM and Infineon.
MasterCard, the official sponsor of UEFA Champions League, has carried out a research of the UEFA Champions League 2008 final held in Moscow from an economic point of view. The author of the research is one of the leading world experts of the sports industry, Professor Simon Chadwick from the International Sports Business Center, University of Coventry.
According to the central bank of South Korea – Bank of Korea (BOK), the country has proposed to China and Japan that a joint network be set up to connect ATMs in the three countries. The cross-border network would enable travelers to withdraw cash at minimum cost from any ATM in China, Japan and South Korea.
According to Celent, Boston-based international research company (USA), in the coming two years the mobile banking will gain momentum in the leading European markets – Spain, France, Italy and Great Britain: it will grow from the current average 6 % up to 25 % in 2010.
Dr. Web Company announced a new version of Dr. Web scanner. It is capable not only to detect invisible rootkit Win32. Ntldrbot (aka Rustock. C), but also to treat the system files infected by it.
Reserve Bank of India (RBI), the Central Bank of the country, finishes elaboration of the basic principles of India’s mobile payment regulation systems. The Central Bank of the country plans to publicize the draft principles on its website before June 15, 2008.
United Card Service Company (UCS) has summed up the results of its work in 2007.
Tuxedo Money Solutions Company, UK prepaid card company, has launched The Times MasterCard prepaid card with PayPoint, UK convenience store-based bill payment network. The card is targeted at readers of The Times newspaper.
E-Zwich, national system of electronic payments, was launched in Ghana. The project was co-implemented by several banks of the country led by the Bank of Ghana. The basic technology supplier for E-Zwich was Net 1UEPS Technologies (Johannesburg, Republic of South Africa), company traditionally specializing in chip card projects.
Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) has launched a public consultation into eBay’s proposal to limit the type of payments it will accept on its Website.
Early in May, 2008, the International Bank of Azerbaijan (IBA) began to issue American Express cards.
RUCARD GROUP processing company announced that it had successfully passed the PCI Compliance certification program and got Certificate of Compliance from the international company Trustwave. Information Sec. &Compliance. The latter has the status of QSA (Qualified Security Assessor) and the powers of an international payment system for implementation of all the necessary checks of еру participants for conformity to the standards of PCI DSS (Compliance Validation Services for the PCI DSS).
Visa Inc. announced extension of its package of payment solutions and presented a new card – Visa Meetings, intended to raise the efficiency of the corporate costs strategic management. The given step is due to the growth of the company’s costs for carrying out of business meetings, events, conferences, exhibitions and promotion campaigns all over the world.
SBERBANK of Russia has launched a new credit card mass issue program. The number of the potential customers of the new product is estimated by the bank’s management as 20 million persons.
By the end of April, 2008, the number of retailers servicing cards of China UnionPay (CUP), Chinese payment system, in Japan exceeded 10 thousands. At the same time the number of CUP-accepting ATMs, installed in the Japanese network, reached the level of 46 thousand devices.
According to European Commission (EC) report, consumer worry about payment fraud essentially hinders development of cashless payments in Europe and hence is a menacing factor for the success of the single payment market project.
Notwithstanding important success with the growing volume of the bank cards issued in Vietnam, analysts point out, that the local banks are too late with expansion of their РђРўРњ networks. Thus, at the beginning of the second quarter of 2008 the density of all ATM networks in Vietnam was not more than 50 devices per 1 million people, or one РђРўРњ per 20 thousand consumers. As a result of the situation that has evolved, at the end of each month clients experience serious difficulties with getting their salary due to lack of ATMs to withdraw cash.
State-owned Indian banks with foreign branches addressed the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) with a request to discriminate between domestic and foreign banks in terms of allowing customer access to shared ATM networks.
The press-service of Lockheed Martin Company (the winner of the Next Generation Identification FBI tender for establishment of the world’s biggest biometric identification base) announced that on May 2, 2008, IBM Company joined the project.
Karen Webster, President of Market Platform Dynamics, British consulting company, has published her reflections on mobile payments in Catalyst Code blog.
According to the National Bank of the Republic of Belarus, by April 1, 2008, the number of cards issued by Belarus banks exceeded 5.1 million.
Results of the research of Russian citizens’ economic moods have shown, that in the spring of 2008, the index of consumer moods has exceeded 130 points. The research was spent by the strategic researches centre of the assurance company Rosgosstrakh.
Bank "Credit-Moscow" together with the Okdail company (passenger service in trains and at railway stations) and company-carrier "Global-express" have launched the project of payment cards acceptation in the trains plying on routes «Moscow - St.-Petersburg» («Nikolaevsky Express Train», «Neva Express Train») and "Moscow-Helsinki" (express train "Lev Tolstoy"). Visa, MasterCard or Diners Club cardholders of any issuers can make payments for purchases in dining-cars of these trains.
The Estonian mass-media inform on growth of the insolvent borrowers number who have taken a buyer's credits via SMS (the so-called SMS loans). The SMS loan assumes huge interest on credit. So, for example, the firm Creditmarket provides private persons with «fast credits» under 986 % a year.
According to the British Retail Consortium (BRC), the attitude of UK consumers to the expenses on credit is becoming cooler, and they are turning back to cash. So, despite the launch of alternative projects by the British card companies, cash has increased its dominance as a means of payment in the last 12 months.
The program for the VeriFone’s preferred resellers designed to enhance its key distributors' ability to roll out customized offerings to merchants, started in the USA. The project is participated by such companies as The Phoenix Group, POS Portal and Alliance Data.
National Australia Bank (NAB) and Australian telecommunication company Telstra launched the implementation of joint project on the ATM installation using the mobile communication. Such ATMs that can be deployed at major outdoor events to provide convenient access to cash for the customers.
Economic downturn threat has compelled USA banks to increase expenses on technologies, granting of new payment products and perfection of network and wireless services.
According to the message of the central Philippine newspaper «Philippine Daily Inquirer», the country government is drawing up an emergency scheme to offer the poor household the access to the limited government-subsidized rice by issuing out "access cards". The cards issued only for head of a household, will contain the basic information about the beneficiaries, their finger prints and names of the members of their households.
According to the senior commissioner of the Central criminal police (division of the Estonian police) Kalmer Viska’s declaration to a number of mass-media, usually young people with uncommon abilities take part in cyber-crimes, what results in putting a lifelong brand on their reputation.
According to the Ukrainian interbank payment systems members association ЕМА, on April 1st, 2008 about 54 million cards of Visa International and MasterCard Worldwide are issued by the Ukrainian banks. In comparison to the turn of the year, the volume of cards issue of Ukrainian banks has grown more than on 3 million maps.
On the intercity high-speed railway Beijing-Tianjin, which operation will begin to the opening of the Beijing Olympic Games on the 1st of August 2008, a new ticketing system will replace traditional paper tickets with electronic ones. Except other obvious advantages, the electronic tickets will be safer against fake attempts. Debugging and testing of operations have begun in the first quarter 2008 as a part of the 13,324 billion yuans ($1,7 bln.) project of the given railway construction began on July 4th, 2005.
At the end of 2007, Motorola, Inc. has announced the strategic relationship between its division of the Enterprise Mobility business, specialising on radio-frequency identification RFID, and Intelleflex, the Intelligent RFID Platform Company, to deliver best-in-class Extended Capability RFID solutions.
PayPal Company plans to prevent «unsafe» Web browsers from accessing its online payment system in a bid to combat phishing attacks. The eBay subsidiary defines as unsafe out-of-date browsers that lack the latest security patches and upgrades.
According to Javelin Strategy & Research, U.S. consultancy, arming consumers with expanded account monitoring tools is critical to increasing credit card security. Consumers want to monitor and protect their accounts, and providing them with the necessary tools will strengthen customer loyalty.
MasterCard Worldwide within the framework of a joint project with Spanish bank groups La Caja Insular de Ahorros de Canarias and EURO 6000 started mass issue of the first in Europe contactless mini-cards MasterCard PayPass.
Estonian banks announced that from the beginning of May, 2008, day limits for the clients using code cards to enter Internet banking system will be lowered from 10 thousand up to 5 thousand kroons. The measure was taken by banks right after a mass hacker attack against Internet clients of Hansapank.
By the end of the first quarter of 2008 the number of issued SBERBANK cards grew by 5.6 % compared with a similar index of the previous quarter and reached 24.6 millions.
Fidelity National Information Services (FIS), one of the worlds’ leading processing companies, began to service 5 million credit cards emitted by Brazilian bank Banco Real on the basis of its affiliated company Fidelity Processadora e Servicos in Brazil.
NBU decision № 53 of March 5, 2008, «About settlement of questions concerning operations with the use of software-hardware self-service complexes» has come into force in Ukraine. The decision streamlines operations of accepting cash for a subsequent transfer; special payment operations, and other operations, connected with means’ movement and also with obtaining of information on the state of accounts through self-service terminals.
NovoPayment, a Latin American prepaid card issuer, jointly with the Venezuelan mall chain Sambil Malls Group began issue of co-branded Sambil Visa Gift Card.
A Visa card that combines pre-pay functionality with proof-of-age verification has been launched in the UK.
According to press reports, a group of major French and German banks are looking to establish a pan-European card network that will compete with the schemes operated by Visa and MasterCard in the region.
On April 15, 2008, within the framework of the forum Oracle AppsForum 2008, Oracle Corporation announced the main trends in the development of its family of business applications, and also new opportunities for Russian and CIS customers.
New Zealand processor Paymark has teamed up with the local companies NZ ATM and ATM Plus to launch the country’s first pilot of convenience ATMs. These are ATMs that are not owned by a bank, and charge an additional fee for transactions.
Vasco Data Security International is selling its online authentication devices direct to end users with the launch of its Digipass for Retail division. Its previous business model involved selling the devices exclusively to banks and other financial institutions.
The U.S Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has filed in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York a complaint against fraudsters who used stolen identities to trade shares and manipulate stock prices.
According to standards organization EMVCo, in 2008 banks and merchants outside of the United States will have the option of installing standard contactless readers that can accept payment from contactless cards, fobs or mobile phones with a Visa payWave, MasterCard PayPass or JCB J/speedy application onboard. At present, however, a contactless EMV application from Visa Inc. generally won’t work on the same terminal as one from MasterCard Worldwide or from JCB.
China Life Insurance Co., the biggest national insurance company in China, has invested 300 million US dollars from its own foreign currency assets in the initial public offering (IPO) of Visa Inc. This transaction became the China Life’s largest investment in the American stock exchange.
VeriFone is launching a product to help retailers protect customer card data in the event of a network breach. The company offers VeriShield software-hardware set, which encrypts card data in a VeriFone terminal at the stage of information transmission from a POS terminal to the place of destination.
According to representatives of Visa Europe, contrary to the views formerly widespread among experts that retail on-line shops would soon prevail over regular shops, the present situation in the world markets is such that these two channels of sales and goods promotion will most likely complement each other.
According to mass-media, Takakura Tamio, president and head of JCB Company, announced his company’s plans to concentrate its efforts on new technologies, including contactless payments.
By the end of 2008 Barclaycard plans to issue 1 million contactless credit cards in the UK. Clients of the affiliated company of British Barclays Bank are 10.1 million credit cardholders. The company also plans to increase the number of the retailers equipped with OneTouch contactless terminals from 4 000 up to 20 000 by the end of the year.
UK credit card giant Barclaycard is reportedly launches a trial of contactless retail and transit payment using mobile phones that support Near Field Communication (NFC). Shortly before this announcement, in the end of November,2007, rival Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) announced its launch a consumer trial of NFC-based debit payment in early 2008.
SCM Microsystems Company, producer and supplier of smart-card hardware based in Germany and the USA, has started manufacture of NFC-reader SCL3710. The device enables a PC to accommodate contactless payment and information exchange with mobile phones and other handheld electronic devices utilizing Near Field Communications connectivity (NFC).
WebMoney Transfer, Internet electronic payment system, announced a launch of Keeper Embedded service – a platform for financial interaction between the social networks’ users. Thus, the owners of the social networks can offer the users an easy way for opening of payment accounts inside the community on the basis of Keeper Embedded interfaces.
According to the People's Bank of China) — Central bank of China, by the end 2007 the Chinese banks issued 1.5 billion payment cards, or 32.6 % more than in 2006.
American payment system Discover Financial Services (division of Morgan Stanley Bank, specializing in servicing of individual and corporate credit cards), announced its purchase of the international payment system Diners Club International from CitiGroup.
According to The Times of India, New Delhi city authorities (India) decided to use biometric technologies to counter begging during preparation and holding of the Commonwealth Games in India in 2010.
Sweden's Precise Biometrics is to participate in a European Union-funded secure identity management project – Turbine (TrUsted Revocable Biometric IdeNtitiEs). The biometric technology developer will receive a SEK 5.7 million (US$1 million) grant from the project. Other participants in the project include Philips Research Europe, Katholieke Universiteit Leuven and GjС?vik University College.
US-based Global Payments and Planet Payment processing companies have signed an agreement to provide a «pay in your currency» service for HSBC's merchants in China. The service is expected to be launched in time for the 2008 Beijing Olympics.
NACFIN in its Russian market survey done early in March, 2008, within the framework of the research project «Financial services for population», estimated the number of Russians who are likely to become victims of financial pyramids.
According to Internet-survey of Javelin Strategy and Research done among 2192 American consumers, mobile person-to-person (P2P) payments and transfers have the potential to replace credit and debit card payments.
According to representatives of Interac, local debit payment system (Canada), in 2007 the Canadian banks’ losses from debit card fraud reached 106.8 million Canadian dollars (105.3 million US dollars).
According to RSA Security’s Online Fraud Report of February, 2008, criminals continue improving computer attacks on financial institutions.
According to the UK Association for Payment Clearing Services (APACS),
in 2007 the total sum of the loss from payment card fraud in Great
Britain increased by 25 % and reached 535.2 million pounds (1.08
billion US dollars).
According to the U.S Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs (INL), criminals are likely to use mobile payment systems for money-laundering and financing of terrorism. The warning was published in International Narcotics Control Strategy Report, 2008.
China Minsheng Bank has issued its first JCB-branded credit card. The new product - Minsheng Lady Flower-Aupres card is co-branded with Chinese cosmetics firm Shiseido Liyuan.
According to the available information, 35 million contactless payment cards have been issued in the USA in the first quarter of 2008 - products MasterCard PayPass, Visa payWave and American Express ExpressPay, with 400 000 POS-terminals in place at 80 000 merchant locations. According to the management of Inside Contactless, in 2008 the volume of the issued contactless payment cards will increase up to 50 - 60 million.
On March 25, 2008, during the Board’s session of the Ministry of Information Technologies and Communications of the Russian Federation, Andrey Kazmin, Director General of Russian Post, presented a program of the enterprise development for the period up to 2011, including a complex of anti-recessionary measures. As a result of its implementation Russian Post will become a modern and efficient company.
According to Vladimir Lopatin, Director of OSMP Company, starting from April 1, 2008, the company’s network of terminals will offer a service for credit repayment of Alfa-Bank and “Тinkoff Credit Systems” bank. In future other banks are to be connected to the project.
The first results of Visa Int. IPO proved its status of the biggest in the history of the US equity market. So, the income received by Visa Inc. during the campaign on March 18, 2008, reached 17.9 billion US dollars.
In January, 26-27, 2008, the National Financial Research Agency (NAFI) polled 1600 persons of 153 settlements in 46 regions, territories and republics of Russia. The polls were done within the framework of the Financial Services for the Population research project aimed to study the topical aspects and problems of the financial sphere in Russia.
Doctor Web Company (holder of Dr. Web trademark) has received
certificates of the Federal Security Service (FSB) of the Russian
Federation on 11 anti-virus Dr. Web products of 4.44 version, and also
a certificate of the Federal Service on Technical and Export Control
(FSTEK) on the improved version of a special product – KPAZ 2.0 (Set of
Anti-virus Protection Programs) for State Automated System “Vybory” of
the Russian Federation.
In 2007 the total volume of American Express checks sold all over the world reached 17.22 billion US dollars.
The recent investigation into the financial affairs of former New York
Governor Eliot Spitzer has highlighted the extent to which U.S banks
are using technology to scrutinize the transactions of their customers.
According to the British Association for Payment Clearing Services (APACS), in 2007 UK donations to charity by plastic card rose to Р?1.013 billion (US$2.028 billion) in 2007 from Р?842 million in 2006. The average value of a UK donation on a plastic card in 2007 was Р?44.75
Within the framework of anti-terror actions the UK Security Service MI5 is seeking access to the travel records of millions of citizens using smart travel cards such as London's Oyster card.
Financial Services Authority (FSA) of Great Britain warned British banks to pay more attention to risk management as volatile market conditions continue.
According to a Forrester Research survey, the behavior model of
American consumers compels the online retailers to introduce
alternative methods of payments, in particular, without the use of
payment cards.
According to representatives of the local debit payment system Interac
Association (Canada), a solution to such a problem as raising wave of
debit card fraud is to a great extent linked with EMV-migration.
By the present moment the number of cards, issued by Sviaz-Bank, has exceeded 350 thousands, at that over 56 thousand cards have been issued since January 1, 2008.
According to a research of Harris Interactive Company, 53 % of
Americans do not show interest in mobile banking. Out of 1072 adult US
citizens polled only 16 % used their mobile phones for this kind of
service.
Secure Identity Systems (SIS) Co. intends to promote among US card
issuers a technology allowing to locate mobile phones and use this an
additional tool to combat fraud in POS and ATMs.
According to a research done by You Gov, consulting company, to order
of VeriSign, US-based company specializing on Internet security,
British Internet users risk to lose up to 361 billion pounds (726
billion US dollars) as a result of giving their personal data to
insecure or poorly protected web-sites.
On March, 19th, 2008, Visa Inc. international payment system began
trading at the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE). Price per one share
under stock symbol V was initially declared as 37-42 US dollars, but at
the last minute it was increased up to 44 US dollars. Nevertheless,
with the beginning of trading Visa shares were sold at a price 30 %
higher. The company offered for sale almost half of all its equities –
406 million shares.
According to the official data of the Bank of Russia, as of January,
1st, 2008, the volume of the credits provided by the Russian banks to
physical persons (in rubles and other currencies) amounted to 3.2
trillion rubles. The given amount grew by 0.3 trillion rubles in the
fourth quarter of 2007 alone.
METRO Group, international retail company, has announced its decision
to use RFID labels with NXP UCODE G2XL chips without user memory for
management of the delivery chains.
EMC Corporation announced the results of research «The Diverse and Exploding Digital Universe: An Updated Forecast of Worldwide Information Growth Through 2011» done by IDC Company to order of EMC. Its results reveal huge volumes and swift growth rates of the digital information created and copied on a global scale.
A number of experts expect the market of RFID technologies to quintuple in the coming 10 years.
L-1 Identity Solutions Company has signed a contract with Tribunal Electoral de Panama envisaging modernization of the national ID system, which is used, among other things, for registration of voters.
Greater Manchester Passenger Transport Executive (GMPTE), UK, British
transport company Arriva Manchester and sQuidcard, company specializing
in development and promotion of contactless smart card solutions, have
signed an agreement.
According to MasterCard Worldwide, the number of MasterCard chip cards
has exceeded 300 million, which is about 20% of MasterCard’s total
number of cards.
Barclays Bank, the third bank in Britain by its own capital stock,
announced that it had signed agreement with Petropavlovsk Finance
Company on acquisition of 100% of Expobank shares.
BPC Company announced that it had signed a contract with the
franchising of DinersClubInternational in New Zealand on introduction
of SmartVista product family within the framework of the project for
the company’s processing infrastructure modernization.
According to British company MoneyExpert survey, notwithstanding the
growing concern about the credit crisis, about 3.2 million Britons are
holders of 5 or more credit cards. They spend more, than they earn, and
accumulate debt.
German Gref, new head of Sberbank of Russia, announced his plans to
form a new division within the bank for small business crediting and to
implement on its basis such business direction as micro-financing,
taking as example the experience of Grameen Bank (Bangladesh) and his
founder Muhammad Yunus.
Bank of China placed an order for almost 16,000 VeriFone POS-terminals, including GPRS-enabled Vx 610, the CDMA-enabled Nurit 8000, and the countertop Nurit 2930 incorporating a dial-up modem and sprocket printer. All the above equipment will be delivered during 2008.
As is known, Lockheed Martin has won the FBI tender for formation of Next Generation Identification, the largest in the world database of fingerprints, irises, faces, scars, manners of speech and movement.
According to Nielsen, American research company, in 2007 the total number of clients of Internet shops reached 875 million, which is 40% more than in 2005.
According to Kurt E. Amend, US Consul General in Russia, even after 2011 his government will continue to grant entry visas to Russians without biometric foreign passports.
In accordance with the decision of the Central Bank of Uzbekistan, the Ministry of Justice has confirmed and registered «The rules for organization of the payment systems using the common telecommunication networks» of February 13, 2008.
Analysts from Home Credit and Finance Bank (HCF Bank) in their research «Consumer crediting – 2007» estimated the growth of the Russian credit card market as 178 billion rubles (about 7.4 billion US dollars), which is 23% more than in the previous year.
JCB and Cassis International, Singapore-based provider of smart card technologies, have signed an agreement on a pilot project on application of Near Field Communications (NFC) technologies for making payments.
A few days ago a key vacancy was closed in the Moscow Office of Visa Int. – on March 3, 2008, the post of the Director General of Visa Int. in Russia was occupied by Maarten van den Belt, a person with considerable experience in Russia.
According to RetailBankingResearch (RBR), London, the number of credit cards in the market of Central and Eastern Europe tripled in the period of 2004-2006.
Following Egg, a major Internet bank (subsidiary of Citigroup), British company Barclaycard also decided to reduce the number of its cardholders.
Breaking of a chip card security demonstrated by Adam Laurie, top manager on security and Director of The Bunker Secure Hosting, at Black Hat 2008 Conference gave rise of anxiety concerning the security of RFID technology applied for contactless payments.
According to the Russian mass media, former top managers of Sberbank of the Russian Federation were appointed to the leading posts in Sviaz-Bank. Thus, now the Deputy Chairman of the Board of Sviaz-Bank is Vladimir Mamakin, who previously made his career in Sberbank, rising from a senior economist up to the Director of the Financial Department.
IPO of Visa Int. plans to attract 12.6 billion euros in the New York Stock Exchange. In particular Visa Int. intends to sell 406 million shares priced from 37 up to 42 US dollars per share, and, if the demand is high enough – 40 million additional shares.
Bangkok Bank, a major commercial bank in Thailand, jointly with Visa Int. and SkyTrain, operator of the elevated railway of Bangkok, became the first in the country to issue Blue Wave contactless credit cards, supporting Visa payWave technology.
Within the framework of the panel discussion «Mobile payments and mobile commerce: prospects for development in Russia and in the world» held late February 2008, Leonid Reiman, Minister for Information Technologies and Communications, announced a launch of the project of mobile commerce pilot zones in Moscow, St.-Petersburg and Sochi.
Vodafone Company and Roshan, Afghan telecom agency, were the first to introduce in the Afghan market a mobile money transfer service called Рњ-Paisa.
According to APACS, the UK Payments Association, the results of the Dedicated Cheque and Plastic Crime Unit (DCPCU) activity in 2007 were quite successful.
Following Great Britain and the USA a new social Internet network established specially for provision of mutual credits between private persons – IOU Central online – was launched in the Canadian market. Its principle of operation is traditional.
According to mass media, the Federal Tax Service of Russia considers the question of possible tax collection via payment terminals. According to opinion polls most defaulters plead long and tiresome queues in Sberbank.
On January 31, 2008, the seventh annual meeting of the Central Bank of the Russian Federation management with the heads of commercial banks was held in «Bor» boarding house near Moscow on the initiative of the Association of Regional Banks of Russia.
The second year running the International Association of Outsourcing Professional (IAOP) conferred the title of the «Leading Supplier of Outsourcing Services» to Diebold Company.
MasterCard Worldwide and USA Technologies Inc. have announced a 4 thousand increase of the vending machines number equipped with PayPass technology in the USA.
British Airports Authority (BBA) intends to implement a pilot project of marking air-passengers’ luggage with RFID chips in Heathrow Airport, London.
Leonid Reiman, Minister for Information Technologies and Communications of the Russian Federation, announced that the Ministry had developed a concept of mobile micro-payments.
Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman and IBM corporations will be the major competitors for formation of Next Generation Identification, the world’s biggest database of fingerprints, irises, faces, scars, manners of speech and movement, an order for which is soon expected from FBI. The sum of the contract is evaluated as tens of millions US dollars, while the total cost of the project amounts to one billion dollars.
The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) has announced a new standard – ISO 19092:2008, regulating application of biometric technologies in the financial sphere.
NXP Semiconductors Company, Kiev Metro (subway) and Card-Systems
Company (Kiev, Ukraine) have announced launch of the project on travel
payment automation in Kiev subway by Mifare transport cards from NXP in
commercial operation.
According to research done by Gartner, American consulting company, by
2010 social networks of Zopa (Zone of Possible Agreement, UK) and
Prosper (USA) will control about 10 % of retail crediting and financial
planning world market.
Western Union jointly with Philippines telecom companies Smart Communications and Globe Telecom has launched two mobile money transfer service pilots within the framework of the program by the GSM Association. The aim of the program is development of the international mobile money transfer systems.
According to the Russian mass-media, the Ministry of Finance of the Russian Federation proposes to pay salary and traveling expenses to Russian officials via bank cards.
The Association of Regional Banks of Russia has published amendments developed by its experts to the current legislation.
BPC Company announced joining Payment Card Industry Security Standards Council, PCI SSC.
From April 1, 2008, Ministry of Finance of India intends to oblige Indian corporate and individual taxpayers, who make single tax payments of 50,000 Rupee (US$1,273) and above, to make these payments electronically only.
Consequences of the mortgage crisis force banks to reduce client risks. Thus, Egg, British Internet bank integrated into Citigroup in May, 2007, informed a number of its clients that early in April, 2008, their credit cards would be blocked, and also asked them to pay off all their outstanding credit debts.
Repartition of the Russian market of express-payment terminals continues. Thus, Elecsnet Company has won the tender organized by Gormost state enterprise for installation of 265 express-payment terminals in Moscow underpasses.
VP Bank (Vietnam Joint Stock Commercial Bank for Private Enterprises) became the first Vietnamese financial institution to issue EMV-cards. The bank has implemented the project with support of Gemalto and FPT-IS, local IT company.
US President Georges W. Bush asked the US Congress to increase expenditure for protection against terrorist hacker attacks on the computer networks controlling the country’s power system and other vital objects by 40 %, up to 294 million US dollars. This expenditure is stipulated in the draft budget for 2008-2009 within the national security allocations.
On December 1, 2007, INPAS company and Transcapitalbank launched their joint project for installation of mobile street pavilions for ATMs. The first mobile pavilion equipped with Wincor Nixdorf ProCash 2100xe ATM with a cash-in module was installed by the company in Shchelkovo (Moscow Region) within the framework of the pilot project.
According to Stanislav Popov, the First Vice-Chairman of the Transport Committee of St.-Petersburg, by the middle of 2008 all paper tickets in the infrastructure of the city ground transport will be replaced with smart cards.
Nokia Company and China UnionPay payment system have started implementation of a pilot project of mobile payments based on Near Field Communication (NFC) technology in Shanghai (China).
International Bank of Azerbaijan (IBA, Baku) and Azercell, cellular telecom operator, have started a wide-scale implementation of MobilBank service.
Two Russian banks, Sberbank of RF and Expobank, have concluded an agent agreement with Russian Standard Bank concerning acceptance of American Express cards in the retail points serviced by them.
At the present moment Russian Standard Bank, which holds exclusive right to issue AmEx cards, has similar agreements with about 20 Russian banks, among which are Alfa-Bank, MDM Bank, Raiffeisenbank, Petrocommerce and Globex.
In connection with numerous complaints of passengers against the cabdrivers, who refuse to accept credit cards, New York City Taxi and Limousine Commission announced a «Secret Agent » operation. Within its framework every day from 60 up to 100 agents will take taxis as ordinary passengers and insist on payment by credit cards. The drivers, who refuse to accept this kind of payment, will face a fine of 350 US dollars.
Smart-cards and biometrics are the key technologies used by the Asian banks to expand the segment of microcrediting – such was a conclusion made in the review of the financial division of IDC consulting agency. Materials of the review were published in ZDNet Asia Internet publication.
Alongside with the work on creation of Next Generation Identification, the world's largest computer biometric database (see Plus-daily), the US Federal Bureau of Investigation has started development of the world biometric database.
Japanese law enforcement bodies jointly with a number of companies and
research organizations will develop an innovative «three-dimensional»
system of video observation, which will make a real-time 3D analysis of
the persons, who get in camera coverage, compare the images with the
pictures available in a database of criminals and terrorists, and alarm
in case of coincidence.
Internet Crime Complaint Center, IC3, of the US Federal Bureau of
Investigation warns against the growing number of a new kind of attacks
– «vishing» (voice attacks).
According to APA-Economics, in the middle of 2008, 150 post offices of
AzerPost, state enterprise, will begin to provide money transfer
services, open accounts for entities and carry out other bank
transactions (except for credit and deposit transactions). It is
expected, that by the end of 2008 the financial-bank services will be
provided by 1 200 out of 1 600 post offices in the Republic.
Visa Inc. has announced rating results of Government ePayments Adoption
Ranking (GEAR), which demonstrates activeness of different countries
authorities in electronic payments use. The rating was done by
Economist Intelligence Unit research company by Visa Inc. request.
According to South China Morning Post, a 24 year old citizen of PRC was
sentenced to life imprisonment for taking advantage of a malfunctioning
ATM for his personal enrichment. Lawyers explain this cruel sentence by
obsolete laws and gaps in the criminal code of China, which does not
provide any section about incidents with ATMs.
In 2008 the electronic money transfers will celebrate its anniversary – 90 years from the moment it was done for the first time. Its history began in 1918, when the Federal Reserve Bank of the USA implemented the first money transfer transaction via telegraph.
Seoul-based Shinhan Card, a major credit card company in South Korea, and Visa Int. have started mass distribution of USB Credit Cards, credit cards integrated with a USB-drive.
In autumn of 2007 STMicroelectronics has launched a reference design for a Point of Sale (POS) terminal chip which complies with the Chinese government`s new sales tax regulations.
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