• New York Times, Friday, October 22, 2010 9:54 AM

Tara Siegel Bernard reports that credit card issuers are developing plastic that may not come with bells and whistles but are pretty darn close. Citibank, for example, will test one next month that has two buttons and tiny lights that allow users to choose whether they want to pay with rewards points or credit.

Citi's cards -- known as 2G -- are as thin and flexible as normal cards but contain a battery with a four-year life and an embedded chip. "It's a big deal," says Megan Bramlette, director of research for the Auriemma Consulting Group. "If once a month a consumer can fill up their gas tank for free, and they don't have to do anything except push a button before they swipe their card, that's cool."

The whiz-bang technology may, of course, be the death throes of a passé currency, like wampum, as devices such as cell phones become our virtual wallets. But several card analysts tell Siegel Bernard that it may be a while before a new standard emerges across all phones and merchants.

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