Patent ID: 8311944

Claim:
A system for processing credit card transactions involving a plurality of currency conversions, comprising: an issuing financial institution for issuing credit cards to cardholders; an acquiring financial institution for processing a credit card transaction between a merchant and the cardholder; a credit card association having a communication link to the issuing financial institution for providing credit card processing services; and a transaction processing center having a direct communication link with each of the acquiring financial institution, issuing financial institution, and credit card association, the transaction processing center: (a) receiving foreign exchange rates for each of a plurality of currencies, (b) receiving the credit card transaction from the merchant in a request currency for payment by the cardholder to the merchant, (c) determining a transaction currency as a baseline for currency exchange, account reconciliation, generating statements, and reporting, (d) converting the request currency to the transaction currency, (e) identifying a native clearing currency of the issuing financial institution, (f) analyzing profitability of converting the credit card transaction from the transaction currency to the native clearing currency of the issuing financial institution based on the foreign exchange rate and mark-up and mark-down in monetary value of the credit card transaction, (g) converting the credit card transaction from the transaction currency to the native clearing currency of the issuing financial institution if determined profitable to the transaction processing center, (h) receiving settlement of the credit card transaction in a native settlement currency of the issuing financial institution, (i) identifying a native settlement currency of the acquiring financial institution, (j) analyzing profitability of converting the credit card transaction from the native settlement currency of the issuing financial institution to the native settlement currency of the acquiring financial institution based on the foreign exchange rate and mark-up and mark-down in monetary value of the credit card transaction, (k) converting the credit card transaction from the native settlement currency of the issuing financial institution to the native settlement currency of the acquiring financial institution if determined profitable to the transaction processing center, and (l) converting the native settlement currency of the acquiring financial institution to merchant funding currency.