Card Issuers Face Huge Revenue Challenge

"From a bank perspective, here is why we care about mobile payments: debit, prepaid and credit products are predominantly dependent on interchange revenues that could become less profitable, with a huge negative impact on earnings,” says Philip Philliou, partner at the firm of Philliou Selwanes.

In part because of new regulatory changes and pressures card issuers may find card economics getting worse. “It is inevitable that the revenue side of the business will change downward, so profitability will be affected massively,” he says.

How massive? He expects “more than half the profit for debit and credit businesses” will be affected. Right now, a card issuer can typically expect revenue of perhaps $85 and about $40 of expense, per customer, per month. But the industry expects the economics might fall to something like average revenue of $38 and $40 in expense, so the typical card issuer is “under water,” says Philliou.

Mobile Marketing and Technology