Visa Says Titans Fans Rank Number 1 in Financial Literacy...

Financial Football Competition Ranks NFL Fans' Money Management Abilities

SAN FRANCISCO, Jan. 4, 2011 /PRNewswire/ -- Are fans of the Tennessee Titans the most financially literate in the nation? The current leaderboard on Visa Inc.'s free, online personal finance video game, Financial Football shows that fans of the Titans have notched the most wins among the 32 NFL teams.

In Financial Football, players advance down the field and score by correctly answering personal finance questions. Titans fans have demonstrated their financial literacy by currently leading the league with an impressive 614 wins, followed closely by the Texans, Saints, and Patriots. Conversely, the Rams rank at the bottom with 45 Financial Football wins. The complete ranking, which is updated on a real time basis, can be seen at: www.practicalmoneyskills.com/leaderboard.

"Titans fans are financial literacy MVPs," said Jason Alderman, Senior Director of Financial Education at Visa. "Their showing on the real-life gridiron of personal finance is truly impressive."

Financial Football combines the structure and rules of the NFL with financial education questions of varying difficulty to create an innovative approach for helping people of all ages learn about money management. The game is available in English or Spanish and can be played online or ordered at no cost at www.practicalmoneyskills.com/football. The leaderboard ranking is constantly in flux and fans can improve their team's standing by playing the game.

Financial Football is part of Practical Money Skills for Life, a free, award-winning financial education program that reaches millions of people around the world each year. Launched in 1995, Practical Money Skills for Life gives educators, parents and students access to free educational resources including personal finance articles, games, lesson plans, and more.

About Visa

Visa is a global payments technology company that connects consumers, businesses, financial institutions and governments in more than 200 countries and territories to fast, secure and reliable digital currency. Underpinning digital currency is one of the world's most advanced processing networks -- VisaNet -- that is capable of handling more than 20,000 transaction messages a second, with fraud protection for consumers and guaranteed payment for merchants. Visa is not a bank and does not issue cards, extend credit or set rates and fees for consumers. Visa's innovations, however, enable its financial institution customers to offer consumers more choices: pay now with debit, ahead of time with prepaid or later with credit products. For more information, visit www.corporate.visa.com.

SOURCE Visa Inc.

LEADERBOARD

TEAM		WINS	LOSSES	POINTS
	1.  Tennessee Titans	624	25	8,866
	2.  Houston Texans	600	176	5,471
	3.  New Orleans Saints	356	79	5,261
	4.  New England Patriots	309	143	8,478
	5.  Cincinnati Bengals	220	45	4,933
	6.  Atlanta Falcons	212	182	2,764
	7.  Pittsburgh Steelers	207	52	3,049
	8.  Chicago Bears	192	174	4,970
	9.  Dallas Cowboys	183	178	2,364
	10.  Indianapolis Colts	160	43	2,669
	11.  Green Bay Packers	154	186	2,061
	12.  Arizona Cardinals	139	22	3,217
	13.  Miami Dolphins	125	31	1,840
	14.  Minnesota Vikings	121	60	2,551
	15.  New York Giants	118	36	2,324
	16.  Philadelphia Eagles	115	33	1,838
	17.  Kansas City Chiefs	100	17	2,833
	18.  Denver Broncos	92	19	1,198
	19.  San Diego Chargers	91	21	1,109
	20.  Carolina Panthers	88	59	1,384
	21.  Washington Redskins	81	20	1,055
	22.  San Francisco 49ers	78	13	1,284
	23.  Baltimore Ravens	70	14	2,230
	24.  Cleveland Browns	69	7	1,387
	25.  Tampa Bay Buccaneers	67	7	1,075
	26.  Seattle	64	173	1,108
	27.  Buffalo Bills	54	12	997
	28.  New York Jets	53	7	681
	29.  Jacksonville Jaguars	51	11	1,241
	30.  Detroit Lions	49	169	555
	31.  Oakland Raiders	48	16	1,143
	32.  St. Louis Rams	46	6	548

** Rankings are determined based on total number of wins. **

http://www.ePINDebit.com http://www.iPINDebit.com http://www.e-PINDebit.com http://www.PINDebit.mobi

Citi on Card Networks (V)/MA); PIN Debit Risk Post Durbin; Sensitivity Analysis & Perspective

Citigroup (NYSE:C) on MasterCard (NYSE:MA) and VISA (NYSE:V)

Citigroup Inc. (NYSE:C) analyst took a moment to talk about Card Networks such as MasterCard, and VISA according to a StreetInsider.com report.

Citigroup analyst stated, “In a surprise move, the final Durbin language included a provision ending exclusivity for PIN debit networks. In simple terms, V/MA PIN debit cards will be required to include at least a second network bug (i.e. regional PIN networks such as STAR & Pulse) and merchants will be permitted to direct the routing of the debit transaction to their preferred payment network.”

“V Has More Risk Than MA, But Manageable Overall — V has a 35-40% market share in U.S. PIN debit versus MA’s roughly 10%. We estimate that 60-70% of V’s debit cards are exclusive (meaning no other network bug) compared to our est for MA of 40-50% (co’s do not disclose exclusivity). To us, exclusive cards are the source of potential risk. In a worst-case scenario on lost trans volume, we estimate that only 0.8% of full year EPS is at risk for V and 0.3% for MA. Our worst-case assumes that 20% of exclusive cards get routed away.”

“Overall, we see the PIN debit exclusivity as more of a stock issue than a meaningful earnings risk. This issue does create an overhang on the stocks until the Fed provides guidance, which may take 9 months or more. V/MA valuations are getting more attractive (V 16x our ’11 estimate, MA 14x) but we don’t see multiple expansion until we get visibility from the Fed, despite improved global spend. We would be buyers of American Express (NYSE: AXP) (12.5x) to capture the spend catalysts and strip out debit / Durbin risk. Separately, Discover (NYSE: DFS) (via Pulse) could benefit.”

Shares of Citigroup Inc. stock last opened at for trading at 3.95 and closed at 3.89.  MasterCard last opened at 221.26 and closed the day out at 219.85.  VISA opened at 78.96 before closed down to 77.76.  American Express opened at 41.99 and closed positive for the day at 42.17, while Discover opened at 13.84 before closing up at $14.01 to end trading.

Related articles by Zemanta

• Titans Of Industry Don't Really Like Free Markets (cjr.org)


• Interchange Fee Pact Reached, Visa and MasterCard Shares Jump (pindebit.blogspot.com)

NRF Radio Ads Ask Congress to Keep Swipe Fee Amendment in Financial Reform Bill

Image via Wikipedia

WASHINGTON--(BUSINESS WIRE)--The National Retail Federation today launched a radio campaign urging the House and Senate to keep an amendment seeking reasonable swipe fees for debit card transactions in financial services reform legislation expected to be finalized next week.

“But big banks and credit card CEOs are doing everything they can to keep collecting their swipe fees.”

“With big banks and the credit card industry pushing hard to strip this important consumer protection out of the financial services reform bill, we want to make sure that members of Congress realize how angry small businesses and their customers are about these fees,” NRF Senior Vice President for Government Relations Steve Pfister said. “These fees are driving up costs for consumers at a time when our economy is still recovering. Taxpayers have already paid for one bailout of the banking industry. Consumers shouldn’t be asked to bail out the banks and the card industry again, but that’s what would happen if this amendment is killed.”

The 60-second spots are running in the home districts of key members of the House-Senate conference committee currently negotiating a final version of the Restoring American Financial Stability Act. The panel is expected to complete its work next week, followed by final votes in the House and Senate the following week in order to get the bill on President Obama’s desk by July 4.

The ads open with a husband and wife reading a newspaper article about another bailout of the banking industry, noting that swipe fees cost consumers more than $400 a year.

Husband: “A swipe fee for using my bank debit card? I thought it was like using a check or cash.” Wife: “Using a debit card costs 43 times more than using a check.” Husband: “They’re taking billions. And nobody is doing a thing about it.”

“Congress is trying to do something about unfair hidden swipe fees,” an announcer says. “But big banks and credit card CEOs are doing everything they can to keep collecting their swipe fees.”

The commercial urges listeners to contact their members of Congress and urge them to “fix the debit card swipe fee” and “stop the bailout.”

Swipe fees – officially known as interchange fees – are a percentage of the transaction charged by card company banks each time a card is swiped to pay for a transaction. The fees average between 1 and 2 percent for debit cards and 2 percent or more for credit cards. Overall swipe fees charged to retailers and other business by Visa and MasterCard banks totaled $48 billion in 2008 and resulted in higher prices estimated at $427 for the average household. Debit swipe fees alone amount to about $20 billion of the annual total.

The Senate version of the financial services reform bill includes an amendment sponsored by Majority Whip Richard Durbin, D-Ill., that would require the Federal Reserve to set regulations that would result in “reasonable and proportional” swipe fees for debit cards that take into account banks’ actual costs for processing the transactions and the fact that paper checks drawn on the came accounts are paid at face value. The amendment would also make it easier for merchants to offer discounts or other benefits for customers who don’t use credit cards, and to set minimum purchase amounts for credit cards.

As the world's largest retail trade association and the voice of retail worldwide, NRF's global membership includes retailers of all sizes, formats and channels of distribution as well as chain restaurants and industry partners from the United States and more than 45 countries abroad. In the United States, NRF represents the breadth and diversity of an industry with more than 1.6 million American companies that employ nearly 25 million workers and generated 2009 sales of $2.3 trillion. www.nrf.com

Click here to listen to sample radio ad

www.nrf.com/swipefees

Contacts

National Retail Federation

J. Craig Shearman, 202-626-8134

shearmanc@nrf.com

Permalink: http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20100618005884/en/NRF-Radio-Ads-Congress-Swipe-Fee-Amendment

Hearing Shows Credit and Debit Swipe Fees Cost Federal Government and Taxpayers $116 Million

NRF puts on a different kind of a "Big Show" this time for the Senate



June 16, 2010 01:45 PM Eastern Daylight Time  

WASHINGTON--(BUSINESS WIRE)--The National Retail Federation said a Senate hearing today on the $116 million in credit and debit card swipe fees paid annually by the federal government is further evidence of the need to bring card fees under control.

“These numbers show that not even the federal government is immune from the credit card industry’s power to skim profits off the top of every transaction that takes place on plastic”

“These numbers show that not even the federal government is immune from the credit card industry’s power to skim profits off the top of every transaction that takes place on plastic,” NRF Senior Vice President and General Counsel Mallory Duncan said. “The swipe fees that the card industry imposes on private industry retailers and their customers are bad enough. But swipe fees charged to the government are ultimately paid by taxpayers, even those who don’t hold a credit card. That means swipe fees are not only driving up prices for consumers but driving up taxes as well.”

“There’s a clear parallel here where the card industry sees retailers and their customers as well as the government and taxpayers as huge sources of revenue,” Duncan said. “Congress needs to bring these fees under control for both groups.”

Senate Majority Whip Richard Durbin, D-Ill., is scheduled to hold a hearing on swipe fees charged to the government this afternoon in his role as chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee’s Subcommittee on Financial Services and Government. Witnesses are expected to include officials from the Treasury Department, Government Accountability Office, Amtrak and Visa. Also testifying will be a convenience store owner and consumer group representative emphasizing the need to address private sector interchange fees.

The hearing is expected to focus on a Treasury report released Monday showing that while the federal government accepts few card payments relative to its size, agencies nonetheless received more than 80 million credit and debit card payments for goods, services, fees and fines totaling $8.6 billion last year. The government paid more than $116 million in swipe fees, making plastic its single most-expensive form of collecting payment. The figures do not include the millions of credit and debit card payments accepted by the U.S. Postal Service.

Swipe fees – officially known as interchange fees – are a percentage of the transaction charged by card company banks each time a card is swiped to pay for a transaction. The fees average between 1 and 2 percent for debit cards and 2 percent or more for credit cards. Overall swipe fees charged to retailers and other business by Visa and MasterCard banks totaled $48 billion in 2008 and resulted in higher prices estimated at $427 for the average household.

Like retailers, the government is subject to a wide and complicated range of interchange rates depending on the type of transaction (sale of goods, loan repayments or fines, for example), the level of rewards points provided to the cardholder, and whether the card is present or not present (as in Internet transactions).

The Treasury report proposes that the government negotiate with card companies for a single percentage to be charged for all credit card transactions, and for a flat fee to be charged for all debit card transactions. The report also proposed a $10,000 limit on the size of transactions that could be accepted via cards, saying checks or other forms of electronic transactions would be cheaper for big-ticket transactions. Officials also want to bar the card industry from unilaterally raising fees or establishing new fees. Treasury estimated that the changes could reduce interchange costs between $35 million and $42 million, or about one third.

While today’s hearing is focused on federal costs, state and local governments across the country are also concerned about rising swipe fees. The City of Chicago alone, for, example, recently reported that it paid $7.5 million last year.

The hearing comes as a House-Senate conference committee is negotiating the final version of financial services industry reform legislation. The Senate version of the bill includes an amendment sponsored by Durbin that would require the Federal Reserve to set regulations that would result in “reasonable and proportional” swipe fees for debit cards that take into account banks’ actual costs for processing the transactions and the fact that paper checks drawn on the came accounts are paid at face value. The amendment would also make it easier for merchants to offer discounts or other benefits for customers who don’t use credit cards, and to set minimum purchase amounts for credit cards.

As the world's largest retail trade association and the voice of retail worldwide, NRF's global membership includes retailers of all sizes, formats and channels of distribution as well as chain restaurants and industry partners from the United States and more than 45 countries abroad. In the United States, NRF represents the breadth and diversity of an industry with more than 1.6 million American companies that employ nearly 25 million workers and generated 2009 sales of $2.3 trillion. www.nrf.com

Contacts

National Retail Federation (NRF)

J. Craig Shearman, 202-626-8134

shearmanc@nrf.com

Permalink: http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20100616006476/en/Hearing-Shows-Credit-Debit-Swipe-Fees-Cost