Word: visaed
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...American Express must have taken particular delight last month when AT&T Corp. announced that it was selling its Universal credit-card business to Citibank. AT&T's no-annual-fee entry into the credit-card game in 1990 made this industry universally ugly, particularly for Amex. With free Visa and MasterCard bank cards bulging their wallets, consumers were increasingly leaving home without American Express plastic. Instead of paying membership fees for cards that many merchants refused to honor--since American Express took a heavy bite out of purchases--more than 2 million Amex holders cut up their cards...
...slide in its share of the U.S. card market. With a slew of new consumer cards to go with its traditional strength in corporate plastic, American Express raised its share of the $469 billion general purpose card volume in the first half of 1997 from 18.3% to 18.9%--as Visa saw its No. 1 position slip very slightly from...
...everyone has been wowed by the company's turnaround. Carl Pascarella, CEO of Visa U.S.A., scoffs at American Express as little more than a small-fry compared with his company. That's because Visa puts its brand on nearly 600 million cards that are accepted by more than 14 million merchants around the world, vs. 42.3 million cards and more than 5 million merchants for American Express. "They haven't changed much," Pascarella says of his rival. "Over the past eight or nine years, consumers have been pulling out their Visa card significantly more often than their American Express card...
Pascarella is targeting corporate and small-business markets, where American Express holds a commanding 65% edge. To make inroads, Visa wants to tap the more than $300 billion that U.S. companies spend each year on everything from pencils to planes without using credit cards. "The big opportunity is to displace cash and checks," says Michael Beindorff, Visa's executive vice president for marketing and product management. "It's a market that's there for the taking." Beindorff points out that Visa has already raised its share of the business market from 3% to 20% since 1991, in part by signing...
Robin Williams wouldn't do it for McDonald's. KEVIN COSTNER wouldn't do it for Ralston Purina. But PIERCE BROSNAN has to do it for BMW, Visa, Smirnoff, Heineken, Omega watches, L'Oreal cosmetics and Ericcson cellular phones. The "it" is shilling for products with promotional tie-ins to the new James Bond movie, Tomorrow Never Dies, which MGM/UA will release Dec. 19. The current 007, wanting more control over his image, is likely to renegotiate a tougher deal with the studio for the next Bond installment. Most A-list actors refuse to do commercials for product...