Master Card steals a march over Visa USA
New York: Visa USA has been ordered by Manhattan court to stop charging a special fee that penalized debit card issuers for jumping to smaller rival MasterCard Inc. The latter's shares surged on the news. Analysts said the judgement was a major win for MasterCard's domestic debit business, which trails Visa by a significant margin, but has now been presented with a golden opportunity to capture some of Visa's top customers.

Visa had been charging a "settlement service fee" to any of its 100 largest debit issuers that moved its portfolio to MasterCard to represent the issuer's share of Visa's remaining obligations under the settlement. Visa had settled for $2 billion and MasterCard for $1 billion.

Visa also has to allow any issuer that agreed to the fee to terminate its agreement, so long as the issuer entered into an agreement to issue MasterCard debit cards.
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Kenwood resumes talks with Matsushita
Tokyo: Electronics goods maker Kenwood Corp. has resumed talks with Matsushita Electric Industrial Co. Ltd. to buy a stake in JVC a loss-making electronics firm whose official name is Victor Co. of Japan Ltd.

Shares of JVC fell as the likely deal would involve it issuing new shares to Kenwood, diluting the value of existing JVC stock.

Kenwood, a maker of stereos, car navigation systems and wireless radio equipment, has been in talks to buy 20 billion yen ($165 million) worth of new shares from JVC and then merge with JVC under a holding company, sources said.

Matsushita would then sell part of its 52.4 percent stake in JVC to the holding company. Matsushita is aiming to get loss-making JVC off its consolidated accounts, but may hold on to some of its shares, the sources said.

Shares of Kenwood rose 2.5 percent at 207 yen as of 0135 GMT after surging as much as 10 percent to 222 yen. Shares in JVC tumbled 11.5 percent to 437 yen, while Matsushita's stock rose 2.2 percent to 2,555 yen.
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