Academic

New Rules on "Swipe Fees"

By Gordon Smith, Christine, Hurt, Vic Fleischer, Fred Tung, Lisa Fairfax, David Zaring

Glom readers may remember a TOTM symposium on interchange fees, the fees banks charge retailers for using credit and debit cards.  Yesterday the Federal Reserve proposed new debit-card restrictions, limiting fees to 7 to 12 cents, down from an average of 44 cents.  MasterCard and Visa's stocks tumbled, banks stocks fell less.  Perhaps this is because, according to the WSJ, "the Fed staff members acknowledged that banks may increase monthly checking-account fees and minimum balance requirements or make debit-card reward programs less appealing." 

Full post as published by Conglomerate on December 17, 2010 (boomark / email).