Visa Europe has revealed that it is in talks with Apple Inc. (Nasdaq: AAPL) and its member banks to bring the vendor's new NFC-based mobile payment service, Apple Pay, to European markets, reports the Financial Times (subscription required). NFC-based, or "contactless," cards have gained greater traction on the European side of the Atlantic, and now account for around a fifth of all payment cards.

The CEO of Fingerprints Cards, the Swedish vendor of biometric sensors for smartphones, is under investigation for insider trading, reports Bloomberg. Johan Carlstroem and a former board member are helping the Swedish Economic Crime Authority with its enquiries. Fingerprints Cards recently landed a deal with Huawei Technologies Co. Ltd. , which has included a biometric sensor in its new Ascend Mate 7 smartphone.

And talking of Huawei, the Chinese giant has landed a managed services deal with South Africa's MTN Group Ltd. , covering the group's units in all of the six countries in which it operates. The contract runs for five years, and covers managed network operations, network performance management and spare parts management. Financial details of the deal were not disclosed.

Here's another way for an operator to offer mobile banking services: just open your own online bank! That's what Norway's Telenor Group (Nasdaq: TELN) has done in Serbia, with the launch of Telenor banka. Around 80% of transactions in Serbia are still carried out using cash, so Telenor is hoping to turn more Serbs onto the joy of mobile banking instead.

— Paul Rainford, Assistant Editor, Europe, Light Reading