Thursday, April 14, 2011

JPMorgan (JPM), Wells (WFC) Battling it Out for Microchip Credit Cards

After Wells Fargo (NYSE:WFC) announced it was going to offer microchip-embedded credit cards to its higher end customers, JPMorgan (NYSE:JPM) quickly responded saying it has a goal of beating Wells to market with its own cards.

David Porter, general manager for Chase Card Services, boasted, “Absolutely, we would beat Wells Fargo to market.” Wells said its version of the cards will be released in the latter part of 2011.

At issue is for consumers to be able to successfully make transactions in overseas markets which have limited credit card services. A chip would eliminate much of that limitation and significantly increase revenue for those offering them, which will for sure include the major banks, and probably some of the regionals as well.

JPMorgan was trading at $45.14, falling $1.11, or 2.40 percent, as of 1:12 PM EDT. Wells Fargo was at $30.16, down $0.52, or 1.69 percent.

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