U.S. credit card transaction and dollar-volume growth once again played second fiddle to debit, According to the latest financial reports from MasterCard Inc. and Visa Inc., U.S. debit and still-strong international growth kept the networks’ operating earnings in the black during their quarters ended June 30th.

MasterCard’s U.S. debit- purchase transactions, excluding the PIN-based Maestro brand, rose 17.8% to 1.9 billion in the quarter from 1.61 billion in the year earlier period. Over the same period, U.S. debit purchase volume rose 18.6% to $79 billion from $67 billion.

In contrast, U.S. credit and charge card purchase transactions rose only 0.8% to 1.59 billion, and credit/charge purchase volume increased just 2.8% to $142 billion.

In all, MasterCard’s U.S. credit and debit purchase transactions rose 9.4% from the corresponding year-earlier quarter to 3.49 billion. Worldwide, MasterCard’s network processed 5.22 billion transactions on MasterCard, Maestro, and Cirrus cards, up 13.6%. U.S. credit didn’t fare as badly at Visa, yet growth still fell far short of debit. U.S. debit payment transactions rose 15.8% to 4.91 billion from 4.24 billion in the year-earlier quarter.

Debit purchase volume, including that on Visa’s Interlink PIN-based network, hit $193 billion, up 16.3% from $166 billion in fiscal 2007’s second quarter.

On the credit side, U.S. payment transactions posted a 7.2% increase to 2.17 billion from the year-earlier quarter’s 2.02 billion, while payment volume rose 8.1% to $195 billion from $181 billion.

Posted by John B. Frank Monday, August 11, 2008

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