Juniper Research predicts that mobile content revenues will increase by more than 15 percent this year as more consumers adopt smartphones and increasingly become part of the mobile app craze.

The Mobile World Congress in Barcelona is going on right now and there are a number of hot topics emerging at this year’s event, according to Juniper Research.

Multiple reports are adding fuel to the fire of rumors that Apple’s iPhone 5 will be embedded with a near field communication chip, a move that could shoot mobile payments into the stratosphere.

With corporate behemoths such as Starbucks Coffee Co. and McDonald’s Corp. leading the way, 50 percent of consumers will have made a mobile payment of some kind by 2014, according to Juniper Research.

If Apple enables the iPhone 5 with near field communication, it could signal a tipping point for contactless mobile payments.

Juniper Research projects that annual mobile gambling wagers will surpass $48 billion by 2015, a significant amount by any standard.

Zong’s top executive cited his company’s four newest hires as an indication of the robust growth of the mobile payments space.

Mobile banking usage is set to double in the next three years, reaching 400 million people by 2013, according to Juniper Research.

The value of digital and physical goods that consumers buy via their mobile devices is set to reach $200 billion globally by 2012, according to Juniper Research.

From ringtones, ring-backs and wallpapers to applications, games, virtual goods and video, the mobile content industry in the United States is booming like never before.