The interchange arrangements that underpin this fee structure have tended to be configured in a way that rewards issuance and usage of cards while adding to merchant costs. We have observed in this structure that competition tends to push fees up rather than down because, the higher the fee, the greater the capacity to reward cardholders for using a given card.
*  *  *  In an increasingly globalised world, it is reasonable to ask why regional financial arrangements might still be important and worth striving for. Aren’t we all going to be ruled by Thomas Friedman’s Golden Straitjacket, under the gimlet-eyed surveillance of the Electronic Herd? What place, in this seamlessly integrated world, for regional arrangements?