A discussion of international, domestic, pricing, and operational aspects of electronic payment system risk, with a description of proposals for managing the risk and for reducing Federal Reserve exposure.

A comparison of Fedwire, CHIPS, and GlobeSet payment services for 24-hour global markets, emphasizing the constraining influence of the Federal Reserve's monetary policy responsibilities on Fedwire's market share.

An examination of how much Federal Reserve Banks should charge for daylight overdrafts. A low fee involves questions of moral hazard in central banking, while a high fee raises questions about risk myopia in private credit markets.

Check 21 legislation has enabled the check clearing system to transform from paper to electronics, and much more rapidly than some had predicted. As a result of competition with other payment methods, check use has been declining since the mid-1990s, but because of the rapid adoption of...

Computers and telecommunications devices may replace paper currency and checks—some day. Indeed, electronic methods of transferring money have become widely used. Recently, however, discussion of “electronic money” has taken a new turn, zeroing in on the extent to which holding new forms...

A description of the U.S. payments system, outlining its evolution and examining some of the areas where improvements are needed.

The death of paper checks has been predicted since the 1960s, but only recently has their use begun to decline. The end may be near, though, as two forces accelerate the trend away from checks: the growing acceptance of electronic payment instruments and the passage of legislation designed to...

An investigation of one of the reasons why electronic payments have not yet supplanted cash and checks in retail transactions: Consumers willingness to use an innovation depends on the number of merchants who have already adopted it, and merchants willingness to invest in the innovation depends...

The information age has led to many new forms of payment, including credit cards, debit cards, and online banking. In many ways, these new mechanisms seem preferable to cash. While the disappearance of cash is a very long way off, it seems people are starting to use it less.

An opinion by Cleveland Federal Reserve Bank President W. Lee Hoskins that shrinking the federal safety net, including the payments system, must be a precondition of financial reform in the United States.