American Express buys Revolution Money

American Express is set to acquire Revolution Money for about $300 million to keep up with trends in electronic payments, reports Google News.

Revolution Money offers payments authorised at checkout counters with a PIN number, with about one million merchants participating in the service. To reduce potential for identity theft, Revolution Cards have no name, signature or account number.

American Express chairman and CEO, Kenneth Chenault, says: "Acquiring Revolution Money is one step in expanding our reach in emerging payments, and one of the many we expect to take, but an important one".

Newtek Business Services, a provider of business services to small-to-medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), has signed a partnership deal with Wells Fargo Bank and First Data Corporation, states CNN Money.

Wholly-owned subsidiary of Newtek, Universal Payment Processing of Wisconsin (UPS), has grown to handle over $3 billion in payment transactions. This has led Newtek and UPS to add additional capabilities offered by Wells Fargo Bank and First Data Corporation.

Barry Sloane, chairman and CEO of Newtek, says: "This arrangement will be beneficial to Newtek and its customers, since it will make it possible for us to bring the very best of processing services to the many SME customers we work with, and who rely on us for top quality service in all areas”.

The Visa 'e-commerce consumer monitor Q2 2009' has revealed that despite the recession, Indian Internet users are more confident in using payment cards online, says India Infoline.

The survey also showed that consumers' satisfaction with the security of online payment systems is one of the reasons why more people in India have been shopping online.

The top three reasons for shopping online, cited by a majority of Indian respondents, is the freedom to shop anytime (75%), the ability to compare prices and save money (74%), and save time (74%).