The company also has been trying to gain market share in the U.S. credit card market.
In the Senate and throughout the campaign, President Obama called for measures to strengthen consumer protection in the credit card market.
Ms. CHU: The credit card market is just a fraction of the mortgage market, so the effect is not going to be as big.
Currently, Capital One has 6% of the U.S. credit card market.
Visa and MasterCard now face a massive class action, led by Wal-Mart Stores (nyse: WMT - news - people ), that accuses them of using their clout in the credit card market to force retailers to accept their debit cards, which carry higher processing costs.
Improvement in the macro economic outlook will lead to higher retail spending and greater outstanding credit card balances, a notable positive for Bank of America as the company has nearly 14% share of the U.S. debit card market and roughly 13% share of the U.S. credit card market.
In Japan, overdrafts are practically unheard of, and the consumer-finance market is almost six times bigger than the growing but underdeveloped credit-card market.
Now that America's housing market is ailing, predators have their sights on the country's credit-card market.
The unusual thing about the credit-card market is how the costs of those market-share battles are allocated.
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With profits growing only slowly in the saturated credit-card market, the debit card looks like the next goldmine.
Given the underdeveloped credit-card market, only 10-15% of Ms Yu's customers use them.
The private-label corner of the U.S. credit-card market is enjoying a resurgence as fewer Americans fall behind on their payments.
SHANGHAI Mastercard Inc. on Friday said it expects China to overtake the U.S. as the world's largest credit-card market by number of cards by 2020 because of the country's fast urbanization.
The credit-card market, for example, is intensely competitive, but consumers are often confused by the terms on offer, so card-issuers still make a lot of money from their ignorance and lethargy.
Nearly every credit card on the market today is a variable rate card.
But now that travellers are noticing the fees (and not liking what they see), credit card companies that market heavily to business travellers are responding by waiving them.
Magedson says he is now in talks with several major credit card companies to market the service to their merchants, as well as four major auto related companies to put their dealers into the Verified directory.
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Bank of America is clearly not in the mood to just stand by and watch as technology firms like Google, Square, PayPal and LevelUp eat into the market share of banks and credit card companies in the payments market with mobile payment offerings.
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The company, Ponemon says, gave data from six million customer accounts to a marketing firm in Southeast Asia, where it was eventually posted to a Central Asian site dealing in black-market credit card numbers.
In short, the CARD Act is basically causing a revitalization of free market principles within the credit card space.
And they were papered over by massive leverage, credit card debt, a housing market bubble.
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Before the CARD Act set such trends into motion, consumers were essentially left to their own devices in a nearly-impossible-to-navigate credit card marketplace that defied free market ideas.
And corporate breaches spill millions of customers' credit card information into the black market: A breach in January at the retailer TJ Maxx revealed the private financial data of more than 46 million customers, while Certegy Credit Systems, a branch of Fidelity National Information Services, announced last week that a former employee had stolen and sold customers' data, exposing as many as 2.3 million accounts.
And corporate breaches spill millions of customers' credit card information into the black market: A breach in January at the retailer TJ Maxx (nyse: TJX - news - people ) revealed the private financial data of more than 46 million customers, while Certegy Credit Systems, a branch of Fidelity National Information Services, announced last week that a former employee had stolen and sold customers' data, exposing as many as 2.3 million accounts.
Despite the bullish market forecasts, global credit-card companies are feeling increasingly frustrated with their limited access to the Chinese market, where China UnionPay Ltd.
Americans are strapped for cash, as personal income flattened in June while gas prices rose, further tightening the grip many individuals and families feel from mortgage payments, credit card bills and a weak labor market.
In my view, the ruling essentially brings a heavier dose of the free market to the credit card business in that it will let merchants offer discounts and special deals to customers depending on which piece of plastic they use to pay for things.
If you also find in two or three years' time that you can get a far better deal on your pension plan, or on your home mortgage or your credit card, because the financial services market has suddenly become truly competitive right across Europe that will also be Mr Monti's legacy.
Amex, like all other credit card companies and bank debit-card issuers, uses price to gain market share.
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Australia's competition watchdog has sued credit card company Visa for alleged "misuse of market power".
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