Mobile phones have increasingly become tools that consumers use for banking, payments, budgeting, and shopping. Given the rapid pace of developments in the area of mobile finance, the Federal Reserve Board began conducting annual surveys of consumers’ use of mobile financial services in 2011. This 78-page report, “Consumers and Mobile Financial Services” (March, 2015) examines trends in the adoption and use of mobile banking, payments, and shopping behavior and how the emergence of mobile financial services affects consumers’ interaction with financial institutions.
Visa Certifies Samsung, LG and Blackberry Smartphones as Visa payWave Mobile Payment Devices

The Samsung Galaxy SII, LG Optimus NET NFC, BlackBerry Bold 9900, BlackBerry Bold 9790, BlackBerry Curve 9360 and BlackBerry Curve 9380 have been added to the list of Visa compliant payment products available for commercial deployment by financial institutions.
All the new devices certified by Visa host the Visa payWave application on a secure SIM card and feature NFC (Near Field Communication) technology, the short range communications standard that enables mobile phones to securely transmit payment information to a contactless payment terminal.
“This is an important step for Visa, its financial institution partners and the mobile industry,” said Bill Gajda, Global Head of Mobile Product, Visa Inc. “In addition to issuing plastic magnetic stripe or chip-enabled payment cards, financial institutions can now consider offering their account-holders a way to transform their smartphones into fully functional mobile payment devices.”
Visa’s certification of these smartphones paves the way for mobile device manufacturers, mobile operators and retailers to partner with financial institutions to offer Visa mobile payment functionality to consumers globally.
Visa’s Certification Process
Visa has played a leadership role in establishing global standards for mobile payments, making sure that they are aligned with existing technology and security standards for chip payment cards and can easily be integrated into the existing payments ecosystem. For example: Visa payWave on mobile devices is compatible with existing contactless (NFC) payment terminals already installed at retail outlets worldwide, enabling Visa accountholders to simply wave their enabled phone in front of a payment terminal in order to pay.
Visa has a compliance testing process for both mobile devices and the secure elements that host the Visa payWave mobile application. The process includes extensive technical and usability testing with respect to the Visa mobile payment functionality. This helps to ensure reliable and secure Visa transactions which are compatible with the global standard for chip-enabled payments, and establishes a required signal range for all mobile (NFC-enabled) Visa payment devices. Visa’s compliance testing process helps to ensure the combination of the phone; secure chip and Visa’s mobile payment application will provide the level of security and user experience Visa accountholders have come to expect from Visa.
“Today’s announcement is another example of the momentum we are seeing behind NFC as an industry standard for mobile payments,” said Nick Holland, senior analyst Yankee Group. “Yankee Group predicts that the value of NFC-based transactions will grow significantly, from $27 million in 2010 to $40 billion in 2014.”
Source: Business Wire
U.S. Mobile Payment Market to Top $200 Billion by 2015, Says Research Report
A recent report from Aite Group forecasts that U.S. mobile bill payments will reach more than $200 billion in 2015.
Aite Group interviewed more than 60 companies in the Fall of 2010 and produced a 65 page report that defines and segments the mobile payment industry, and includes an analysis of the competitive and market trends.
Each one of the multiple categories of mobile payments defined in the report will experience double-digit growth, with mobile payments accounting for US$214 billion in gross dollar volume by 2015, up from US$16 billion in 2010–a 68% compounded annual growth rate (CAGR) between 2010 and 2015.
The report references the following companies: Allstate, Amazon, American Express, Apple, AT&T, Bango, Bank of America, Barclays, Bill2Mobile, BlackBerry, Bling Nation, BOKU, Brink’s, C-Sam, Cashedge, Cellfire, Chase, Chase Paymentech, Cimbal, ClairMail, coupons.com, Coupons Sherpa, Visa’s Cybersource, Device Fidelity, Diebold, Discover, Eagle Eye Solutions, eBay, Euronet, Facebook, First Data, FIS, Fiserv, Foursquare, Gemalto, Global Payments, Google, Gowalla, Green Dot, Groupon, Harland Financial Services, Heartland Payment Systems, Hipcricket, iLoop Mobile, Inside Contactless, Intuit, Jack Henry/iPay Technologies, Kubra, MasterCard, mFoundry, Mobile Coupons, Mocapay, MoneyGram, Monitise Group, mopay, MyWebGrocer, NCR, NetSpend, Nokia, Oberthur Technologies, Obopay, OfferIQ, Online Resources, PayPal, Plastyc, Pyxis Mobile, Research-in-Motion (RIM), Roam Data (Ingenico), Roamware, Rocketbuxx, SK C&C USA, Square, Starbucks, Sybase, T-Mobile, Tetherball, 3i Infotech, Tier Technologies, TransferTo, TSYS, Twitter, U.S. Bank, VeriFone, Verizon, Vesta, Visa, ViVOtech, Waspit, Way Systems, Western Union, Wincor Nixdorf, WirelessLoyalty, Xipwire, Yelp, and Zong.
More information: Aite Group Mobile Payment Report.
Source: Aite Group

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