A bi-weekly roundup of news and developments in mobile banking and their impact on the financial services industry.

Malaysia Plans Commercial NFC Launch

The world’s first Near Field Communication service to make it past the trial stage with open-loop, bank-issued payment is on the verge of a commercial launch in Malaysia. Maxis Communications Bhd, the nation’s largest mobile-phone operator, and Maybank plan to launch the service in January, a source tells Cards&Payments magazine.

The service would enable users to tap NFC phones to make retail purchases with a bank-issued contactless credit application from Visa Inc. and with Malaysia’s Touch ‘n Go transit and toll-collection application. The number of NFC-enabled phones available for the launch was unavailable.

About 3,000 retail point-of-sale terminals in Malaysia support Visa payWave contactless cards. The terminals also can accept NFC payment. Maxis, Maybank, Touch ‘n Go and Visa launched a trial in October 2007 in and around the capital city of Kuala Lumpur. When the trial ended in February, Maxis planned to launch NFC commercially during the second half of 2008.

Experts Predict U.S. Mobile-Banking Growth

Though mobile person-to-person funds transfers and mobile payments at the point of sale have yet to launch in the United States, mobile banking is poised to make a big impression on consumers, but obstacles remain, according to speakers at SourceMedia’s ATM, Debit & Prepaid Forum in Chandler, Ariz. SourceMedia publishes Mobile Banker.

Technical hurdles, security concerns and lack of merchant acceptance may keep mobile payment from mainstream consumer acceptance. Until then, mobile banking in the United States and other countries with developed payments infrastructures will take the lead in enabling consumers to use cell phones for financial services, said Elizabeth Buse, global head of product for Visa Inc., at the conference.

Visa is offering three mobile-banking applications for Google Inc.’s Android phone that will provide information about balances, merchant locations and ATM locations. Buse says mobile banking in the U.S. “will be mostly a value-added channel to provide information about a payment instead of replacing the payment itself.”

Mobile Banking in India Puts Key Players at Odds

Mobile-banking regulations in India continue to put financial institutions and mobile operators at odds with each other, according to a report in The Economic Times of India. Telecommunications operators and mobile-application developers want to be allowed to offer payment options to consumers without bank accounts.

“The present set of guidelines will only encourage people who have a bank account to use mobile banking as an additional facility to ATM or Internet banking,” Subho Ray, president of the Internet & Mobile Association of India, told The Economic Times. “It does not address the larger issue of (financial) inclusion of the population which does not have a bank account.”

According to Reserve Bank of India guidelines, only licensed banks that a have a physical presence in India are allowed to offer mobile-banking services. Mobile operators and mobile-application developers want a separate set of guidelines for nonbanking providers who want to offer mobile banking services.

“The current guidelines are welcome, but the [Reserve Bank] may come out with a separate set of guidelines with the same security measures to enable more people in the banking loop,” Abhijeet Bose, vice president for mobile-payment company NGPay, told the Economic Times.

[Thanks: http://www.americanbanker.com]