时间:2019-01-11 作者:英语课 分类:健康与经济


英语课

ECONOMICS 1 REPORT - Changes in the Credit 2 Card Industry
By Mario Ritter


Broadcast: Friday, July 08, 2005


I'm Doug Johnson with the VOA Special English Economics Report.


 
 
The credit card was a revolutionary idea. Today, a small plastic card lets people charge purchases in millions of places. The sellers 3 get paid through an electronic system of banks. The buyers get a monthly 4 statement to pay off. They can buy now and pay later.


The credit card industry is changing all the time.


On June thirtieth, Bank of America announced it would buy MBNA, the nation's biggest independent provider of credit cards. Bank of America will have twenty percent of the credit card market in the United States. The deal was valued at about thirty-five thousand million dollars.


Bank of America is the second-biggest bank in the country after Citigroup. Bank of America will cut six thousand jobs to reduce costs.


MBNA had negotiated 5 with another bank, Wachovia. In fact, on June seventeenth, a helicopter carrying top MBNA officials from secret talks in New York crashed in the East River. All survived, but not hopes for a deal. Wachovia lost interest.


The first widely used credit cards did not use the bank system most commonly used today. Diners Club started in nineteen fifty. American Express issued its first charge card in nineteen fifty-eight.


That same year, Bank of America offered BankAmericards to sixty thousand people in Fresno, California. BankAmericard grew into the huge system known today as Visa.


Most American families have at least one credit card. The Federal 6 Reserve, the central bank, says Americans have more than seven hundred thousand million dollars in credit card debt. They pay an average interest rate per year of about twelve to fourteen percent.


Some card users 7 pay all their charges each month, so they do not owe interest. Others make only the small payment 8 required. If they owe thousands of dollars, the debt can take years to pay off.


And that is not the only danger. Information security 9 and identity 10 theft are major issues these days. Recently there have been several incidents in which many people had financial information either lost or stolen.


Someone stole records from the computers of CardSystems Solutions, a payment processing company. That incident put forty million Visa, MasterCard and other card numbers at risk of misuse 11.


This VOA Special English Economics Report was written by Mario Ritter.  I'm Doug Johnson.



n.经济学,经济情况
  • He is studying economics,which subject is very important.他正在学习经济学,该学科是很重要的。
  • One can't separate politics from economics.不能把政治与经济割裂开来。
n.信用,荣誉,贷款,学分;v.归功于,赞颂,信任
  • I credit him with a certain amount of sense.我认为他有一定的见识。
  • He got the credit,and we did the dirty work.他得荣誉,我们做不讨好的工作。
n.卖者( seller的名词复数 );卖方;销售者;销售商
  • buyers and sellers transacting business 进行交易的买方和卖方
  • All manner of hawkers and street sellers were plying their trade. 形形色色的沿街小贩都在做着自己的买卖。 来自《简明英汉词典》
adj.每月的,持续一个月的,每月发生的;adv.每月,按月; n.月刊;(复数)monthlies:月经
  • The rent on his apartment was his biggest monthly expense.他的房租是每个月最大的开支。
  • The monthly rent is $15,inclusive of light and water.每月租金15美元,包括水电费在内。
谈判,协商,议定( negotiate的过去式和过去分词 ); 兑现(支票等); 通过,越过(险要路段)
  • The government negotiated with the opposition party over the new law. 政府就新法与反对党进行了协商。
  • By careful strategy she negotiated a substantial pay rise. 她精心策划后,谈妥了大幅增加工资的事。
adj.联盟的;联邦的;(美国)联邦政府的
  • Switzerland is a federal republic.瑞士是一个联邦共和国。
  • The schools are screaming for federal aid.那些学校强烈要求联邦政府的援助。
用户,使用者( user的名词复数 )
  • The new software will prove a boon to Internet users. 这种新软件将会对互联网用户大有益处。
  • Ramps should be provided for wheelchair users. 应该给轮椅使用者提供坡道。
n.付款,支付,偿还,偿还,报应
  • I gave ten pounds in payment for the goods I bought.我买那些东西付了10英镑。
  • This last payment will wipe out your debt to me.这最后一笔付款将了结你欠我的债务。
n.安全,安全感;防护措施;保证(金),抵押(品);债券,证券
  • A security guard brought him down with a flying tackle.一名保安人员飞身把他抱倒。
  • There was tight security at the airport when the President's plane landed.总统的专机降落时,机场的保安措施很严密。
n.身份,本体,特征;同一(性),一致
  • He never revealed his identity.他从未暴露过自己的身份。
  • He showed his identity card and went in.他把工作证亮了一下就进去了。
n.误用,滥用;vt.误用,滥用
  • It disturbs me profoundly that you so misuse your talents.你如此滥用自己的才能,使我深感不安。
  • He was sacked for computer misuse.他因滥用计算机而被解雇了。
学英语单词
abnormal operation
adenophyllous
administrative authority
auricular lappet
avocados
basihyal cartilage
Bloody Caesar
bottom cable
bring down the persimmon
bromo-ll-oxoprogesterone
bunkbed
Burroughs
Cheongsando
class sporozoas
coma carcinomatosum
commemorative column
corrosion evaluation
Cotoneaster melanocarpus
cut out key
diamond core drill
diamond-shape
digital platform
diphenyl diketone
dual character of investment
dynamic allocator
family oxyuridaes
Frenchman L.
fully loaded
fustily
germinabilities
graphic art
grey glass filter
hawaiians
helgrammite
hydrodynamic force
Ibwaga
index fossil
infection success rate
java 2 platform enterprise edition product provider
judicial immunity
junt
leaketh
Leys Castle
longleaf pine oil
Lucullus
Makarios III
Medazepol
microcaps
mini-framework
mrnd
multi-variants
needs
Neolithically
niggled
nonvampires
nuclei terminales
offgo
ox (pl. oxen)
Pacapausa
parts caddy
phosphoric bromide
pickers-up
polzeaths
posthatchlings
pottical
pycnidiospores
radioactive fission gas
rageless
Raharney
rear brake van
register of pending actions
retransmission receiver
Royal Command
salted food
schottky diode field effect transistor logic
scribbly gum
seedlings
Selkirk Mountains
sensibon
sine-squared testing
sorptional capacity
sots
stegnogramma cyrtomioides(c.ch.)cheng.
storm maximization
superior alloy steel
swinging out
Süderdorf
tacket
Tirol, Bundesland
tricherie
unconditional stability criterion
unexploded cartridge
urethral apoplexy
Uttar Hārina
vernier time signal
Vinh Loi
vocalizer
vogl
warytre
went off with
workgroup switch
write addressing