FINAL WARNING: The Curtain Falls
single multi-use card which could be used to make deposits, pay bills,
transfer money, make withdrawals, make purchases, and borrow
money. On March 3, 1979, the Knight News Service in Miami, Florida
reported: “By 1980, many bankers predict, most shoppers will
exchange the wallet full of credit cards they now carry for a single, all-
purpose card and number.” In the September 17, 1979 issue of the
Electronic Fund Transfer Report, in an article called “MasterCard,” it
said:“In a speech, John J. Reynolds, President of Interbank Card
Association, said that ‘the newly named MasterCard (formerly
known as Master Charge) will be a full transaction card, rather
than just a credit card ... In significant ways, Interbank now had
brought its EFT strategy in line with Visa’s. The debit card will
bear the familiar red and ochre logo, in the same way that all Visa
cards are blue, white and gold. Even the magnetic stripe
specification adopted for the new MasterCard now embraces an
element introduced by Visa’s three digit service code in the
discretionary datafield of track two. With this code, it will be
possible to determine if a card from one country many be used ...
in another country. D. Sean Miller, Interbank Senior Vice-
President, told EFT Report: ‘the real reason it’s there is that it
would be very difficult to put it in later’.”According to the October 26, 1981 issue of Business Week, Russell E.
Hogg, President of MasterCard International, Inc. predicted: “Within
five to seven years, there will be more debit cards in America than
credit cards.” An article in Time magazine, September 29, 1980
reported: “It looks and feels like a credit card, payment takes place
instantly. A computer deducts funds from the shopper’s bank account
and transfers them into that of the store or restaurant where purchases
have been made...” The cover of the January 18, 1982 issue of
Business Week, depicted a single debit card for nationwide electronic
banking. The accompanying article said: “One month ago key
executives from a dozen of the largest U.S. and Canadian banks flew to
a secret meeting at Chicago’s O’Hare Hilton Hotel to form a joint
venture that would create the first National Retail-Banking Network ...
the new networks should be far more powerful than Visa and
MasterCard because they will operate with the debit card.”