One of the key findings of MasterCard’s Mobile Payments Readiness Index is that it remains early days for mobile payments around the world. However, in examining the consumer research, it emerges that not only were certain countries more ready, certain segments are more ready than others for mobile payments. For the majority of the 34
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U.S. consumers have become acclimatized to the new normal. They’re spending, though they’re spending less. They’re saving, and depending on their circumstances they’re either saving absolutely, or indirectly by paying down debt. That’s the message of this year’s version of Global Insights’ annual look at the credit/debit dynamic (this year very much add prepaid to
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When the Sparkasse in Chemnitz, Germany, let people vote online to choose the new image for their MasterCard credit cards, they got 10 pictures to choose from. These included the Chemnitz City Hall, a few local castles, and the town monument to Karl Marx. According to bank spokesman Roger Wirtz’s comments to Reuters, Marx won
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To students nationwide: I hope you’re just as excited as me! No more must you lug bags of quarters to do your laundry, flatten dollar bills to coax them into vending machines or pay ATM fees to withdraw cash. New technologies can facilitate and encourage use of mobile payments. Soon it will be plausible to
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Everybody jumped a bit when June 11 the Federal Reserve came out with a report asserting that the net worth of the average U.S. household fell 40 percent since the crisis. “Yikes” pretty much verbalizes the reaction, whether you are a financial sophisticate or not. A bit closer to home was the news that credit card
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India is a market that has always fascinated me—so large, so diverse, so educated, and yet so un-banked. According to the World Bank, only 35 percent of Indians have an account with a financial institution. At first I attributed this to the income disparities that exist within India. Recently, I was reviewing the results of
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