MA - Mastercard

[vinod1]

Both Visa and MasterCard have accumulated vast amounts of data over the years. They have historical data of all the places a card is used. They can provide in real-time (in milliseconds) fraud score on a transaction based on all this historical data whenever a card is being used. This significantly reduces fraud in the system. For example, if a person uses a gas station in a zip-code where they have never shopped before, Visa/MasterCard can flag this transaction for further verification.

 

In 2014, fraud losses globally amounted to $16 billion or about 5.65¢ for every $100 worth of transactions. In US, fraud losses are 12.75¢ for every $100. These losses are split roughly 60/40 between issuers and merchants. The fees charged by the card networks of around 10¢ compares favorably to these losses. So both issuers and merchants have an incentive to stay with card networks that can minimize fraud losses. Any new entrant would start with a much smaller dataset and fraud screening would be less effective and fraud costs higher. New entrants thus are at a disadvantage and need to absorb higher losses for several years and is disadvantaged relative to Visa and MasterCard.

 

Biometric identification with mobile payment devices has the potential to reduce these costs but V/MA have a huge lead.

 

Vinod

 

[Liberty]

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/15/technology/visa-mastercard-amex-india-data-law.html

 

MUMBAI, India — When the clock struck midnight in Delhi at the end of Monday, Visa, Mastercard and American Express were suddenly in violation of the law every time an Indian swiped a credit or debit card.

 

They also became unwilling warriors in a budding conflict between America’s technology giants and the Indian government, which wants more control over the data they collect on India’s 1.3 billion residents.

 

The spark for the current fight is a new regulation, issued in April and in effect starting Tuesday, that requires payments companies to store all information about transactions involving Indians solely on computers in the country. The rule and the hubbub over it are part of a debate over a concept known as “data localization,” in which a country places restrictions on data as a way to gain better control over it and potentially curb the power of international companies. American firms have lobbied hard against data localization rules around the world.

 

In India, Visa, Mastercard and American Express, as well as other financial players like Amazon and PayPal, said they needed more time to comply with the order by the country’s banking regulator, the Reserve Bank of India.

[Liberty]

Q3: https://s2.q4cdn.com/242125233/files/doc_financials/2018/Q3/3Q18-Earnings-Presentation.pdf

 

• Record third-quarter net income of $1.9 billion, or $1.82 per diluted share

• Record third-quarter adjusted net income of $1.9 billion, or $1.78 per adjusted diluted share

• Record third-quarter net revenue of $3.9 billion, or an increase of 15%

• Third-quarter gross dollar volume up 13% and purchase volume up 15%

 

EPS up 36% FX-neutral.

[Liberty]

http://europa.eu/rapid/press-release_IP-19-582_en.htm

 

EU fines Mastercard €570 million for obstructing merchants' access to cross-border card payment services

[John Hjorth]

Mastercard News Release [August 6^th 2019] : Mastercard Advances Its Leadership Position as a Multi-Rail Payments Company with the Acquisition of Nets’ Account-to-Account Payment Business.

 

From a local Danish perspective, this is really big. Among the systems [including customers] included in this deal is a system, in Danish called "Betalingsservice" [translates to "Payment Service" in English].

 

I suppose it is one of the most important systems in the Danish financial infrastructure, in line with the Danish central bank's Cognos2, the properitary systems at Danske Bank and Nordea and the systems at the three bank owned datacenters that provide technical infrastructure to all other Danish banks.

 

It's fully integrated with all five Danish e-banking platforms, where you as consumer can manage all your payment agreements without involvement of any person at the bank. Around the 25^th in every month the user receives an overview with all details & specifications of payments next month in the citizen's digital inbox in the cloud [called E-boks], and in e-banking the specification is integrated in module "future payments". It's just a breeze.

 

My guess is that more than 95 percent of Danish households use this system. This system has taken care of all my fixed costs since I left the nest. Today, it handles and processes all payments in our household, less two exemptions : Our dentist bills [our dentist(s) [same practice for us though] does not use the system] and the monthly payments on the primary card used by the Lady of the House [because it's optional for her if she will pay the full balance or roll some of it over to next month, which she never does].

 

Every Danish residential real estate owner or manager with just some decent self-respect uses the system to charge and collect rent, to pay fixed & recurring property costs and mortgage payments, with full integration in their tailored ERP-systems.

 

- - - o 0 o - - -

 

If something similar does not exist elsewhere, this really has business potential elsewhere for M.

 

- - - o 0 o - - -

 

I wonder what is left of Nets after this transaction.

[Liberty]

New CEO:

 

https://www.cnbc.com/2020/02/25/mastercard-names-product-chief-michael-miebach-as-ceo-ajay-banga-moves-to-executive-chairman.html

[Liberty]

Q1: https://s2.q4cdn.com/242125233/files/doc_financials/2020/q1/1Q20-Earnings-Presentation.pdf

 

• First-quarter net income of $1.7 billion, or diluted earnings per share (EPS) of $1.68

• First-quarter adjusted net income of $1.8 billion, or adjusted diluted EPS of $1.83

• First-quarter net revenue of $4.0 billion, an increase of 3%, or 5% on a currency-neutral basis

• First-quarter gross dollar volume up 8% and purchase volume up 8%

[meiroy]

 

How come Week ending April 21 looks better?

[Jurgis]

 

How come Week ending April 21 looks better?

 

IMO - like I said on another thread - people are starting to recover from lockdowns and are starting to spend a bit.

 

But also could be blip.

[Liberty]

https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200623005496/en/Mastercard-Acquire-Finicity-Advance-Open-Banking-Strategy

 

Mastercard (NYSE: MA) today announced it has entered into an agreement to acquire Finicity, a leading North American provider of real-time access to financial data and insights. The purchase price is US$825 million, and Finicity’s existing shareholders have the potential for an earn-out of up to an additional $160 million, if performance targets are met.

[Simba]

Mastercard Incorporated Reports Third-Quarter 2020 Financial Results

 

• Third-quarter net income of $1.5 billion, or diluted earnings per share (EPS) of $1.51

• Third-quarter adjusted net income of $1.6 billion, or adjusted diluted EPS of $1.60

• Third-quarter net revenue of $3.8 billion, a decrease of 14% on both an as reported and a currency-neutral basis

• Third-quarter gross dollar volume up 1% and purchase volume up 2%, returning to positive territory

 

https://s25.q4cdn.com/479285134/files/doc_financials/2020/q3/3Q20-Earnings-Release.pdf

 

I'm familiar with Mastercard's moat, and the ER sell-off looks like a buying opportunity; however, how "moaty" is V/MA dominance going forward? With all the new fintech and Plaid+Visa regulatory scrutiny, it's not clear how long the moat holds, no?

 

Anyone with any insight on this.

 

[Liberty]

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-12-11/mastercard-loses-supreme-court-case-over-u-k-class-action

[fareastwarriors]

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-12-11/mastercard-loses-supreme-court-case-over-u-k-class-action

 

Mastercard fights bid to add 14 million dead customers to UK class action

 

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-britain-mastercard-lawsuit/mastercard-fights-bid-to-add-14-million-dead-customers-to-uk-class-action-idUSKBN2BI2AZ