On 15 July 2010, the US Senate passed the Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act. In addition to many other proposed changes, the US market is now an important step closer to debit card interchange regulation.

In a new client briefing, An Update on the US Debit Interchange Regulation, Celent further discusses the likely developments and impact of the new debit card interchange regulation on the US cards industry.

The Durbin amendment has been updated to reflect a compromise agreement with key conferees on the Wall Street reform bill. This Celent client briefing describes the key points of the revised amendment and highlights the differences from the original. It then raises a number of important questions likely to be on the minds of bank executives and shares Celent’s opinion on likely future market developments.

"The US market is heading towards an issuer-specific interchange rate for debit cards,” says Zilvinas Bareisis, Senior Analyst within Celent’s Banking Group and the author of the briefing. “The implementation of all the proposals would not only reduce profits for many of the issuers but also pose costly operational challenges for the networks and even the Federal Reserve itself.”