Sprint offers mobile banking application

Sprint Nextel announced Thursday a new downloadable application that will let its subscribers bank and pay bills from their cell phones.

The new application called MyMoneyManager will provide online banking access to accounts with BB&T, Citibank, IBC Bank and PNC Bank. Subscribers with accounts at these banks will be able to check balances, pay bills, and find nearby branches with ATMs using the application on their phone. Sprint subscribers must have a Web-enabled phone and a wireless data plan to access the service.

The MyMoneyManager application is available at no additional charge to Sprint data subscribers. In the future, Sprint plans to preload MyMoneyManager on phones. It will also include additional banks and other financial service providers.

The application also comes with a special Send Money feature from PayPal. This feature allows mobile users to check their PayPal account balance and send money to other PayPal users.

Visa also announced several mobile initiatives Thursday. The credit card processing giant said it will allow its credit card customers to transfer money, make payments, and receive real-time account notification alerts on their Nokia phones and cell phones using the Google Android operating system. T-Mobile USA announced the first Android-based phone, the G1, earlier this week. Visa also struck a mobile deal with U.S. Bank, allowing individuals to make money transfers from one Visa cardholder's account to another.

The mobile banking and bill paying market is set to explode over the next several years, according to Celent, a Boston-based financial research and consulting firm. For more on that story, check out CNET News on Friday for a more in-depth feature on mobile banking and bill paying.