447 research outputs found
Prepaid cards: an important innovation in financial services
This paper describes the characteristics of closed-system and open-system prepaid cards. Of particular interest is a class of open-system programs that offer a set of features similar to conventional deposit accounts using card-based payment applications. The benefits that open-system prepaid cards offer for consumers, providers, and issuing banks contribute to the increased adoption of these payment applications. Using these cards, consumers can pay bills, make purchases, and get cash from ATM networks. At the same time, consumers who hold prepaid cards need not secure a traditional banking relationship nor gain approval for a deposit account or revolving credit. By offering prepaid cards, issuing banks may meet the financial needs of consumers who may not otherwise qualify for more traditional banking products and these banks may do so with a card-based electronic payment application that essentially eliminates credit risk for the bank.Payment systems
How effective were the financial safety nets in the aftermath of Katrina?
This paper describes the U.S. financial system’s response to the destruction caused by Hurricane Katrina and examines how financial safety nets helped meet consumers’ needs in the aftermath of the storm. Overall, we find that consumers who hold deposit accounts at financial institutions are less vulnerable to financial disruptions than individuals who do not have either a checking or a savings account (the unbanked). The federal banking regulators’ and financial institutions’ responses to Hurricane Katrina, the financial vulnerability of unbanked families to this unexpected catastrophic event, and how the American Red Cross, FEMA, and the Gulf States’ relief efforts supplied financial assistance to Katrina’s victims are also addressed. Finally, we present several strategies that can be pursued to further safeguard the U.S. population and the financial community against extraordinary events.Hurricane Katrina, 2005 ; Unbanked
Enhanced thermal Hall effect in the square-lattice N\'eel state
Recent experiments on several cuprate compounds have identified an enhanced
thermal Hall response in the pseudogap phase. Most strikingly, this enhancement
persists even in the undoped system, which challenges our understanding of the
insulating parent compounds. To explain these surprising observations, we study
the quantum phase transition of a square-lattice antiferromagnet from a
confining N\'eel state to a state with coexisting N\'eel and semion topological
order. The transition is driven by an applied magnetic field and involves no
change in the symmetry of the state. The critical point is described by a
strongly-coupled conformal field theory with an emergent global
symmetry. The field theory has four different formulations in terms of
or gauge theories, which are all related by dualities; we relate all
four theories to the lattice degrees of freedom. We show how proximity of the
confining N\'eel state to the critical point can explain the enhanced thermal
Hall effect seen in experiment.Comment: 8+5 pages, 4+1 figure
- …