Visa

Visa Inc. is an American payments technology company headquartered in San Francisco, California. It runs VisaNet, a global electronic network that connects consumers, banks and merchants so that card and other payments can be approved and settled in more than 200 countries and territories. For fiscal 2025, which ended on September 30, it reported net revenue of $40.0 billion.

History of Visa

Visa’s story starts in 1958, when Bank of America launched BankAmericard, the first general-purpose consumer credit card. It was a paper card with a US$300 limit and offered revolving credit, which lets a customer carry a balance from month to month. In 1970 the program was incorporated in Delaware as National BankAmericard Inc. under its founder and chief executive Dee Hock.

The network built its technology early. In 1973 it launched an electronic authorization system, followed by electronic clearing and settlement, which are the steps that approve a purchase and then move the money. In 1974 it formed the International Bankcard Company, known as IBANCO, to run the program worldwide, and in 1975 it introduced a debit card.

In 1976 BankAmericard became Visa, a name chosen because it sounds the same in every language, and it adopted the blue and gold flag. In the following decade it launched an ATM network in 1983, developed multiple-currency settlement in 21 currencies in 1986, and sponsored its first Olympic Games in 1988. In 1979 it issued its first travelers cheques in four currencies, and in 1989 it added electronic signature capability by acquiring Interlink. In 1995 it co-created EMV, the industry specification that lets chip cards and terminals work together.

Volume grew fast. Total payments volume reached US$1 trillion in 1997 and US$4.4 trillion in 2006, and Visa passed 1 billion cards issued in 2001, and in 1996 it launched a financial literacy program that is now in more than 20 countries. In 2004 its debit volume surpassed credit volume worldwide. In 2007 Visa restructured into a global corporation, Visa Inc., while Visa Europe remained member-owned, and in 2008 it went public in the largest initial public offering in United States history. Visa Inc. completed the acquisition of Visa Europe in 2016.

Products and services of Visa

Visa provides transaction processing services, mainly authorization, clearing and settlement, among consumers, the banks that issue cards, the banks that serve merchants and the merchants themselves. It calls this structure the four-party model. The company has broadened the model to include digital banks, digital wallets, financial technology companies, governments and nongovernmental organizations.

In practice an issuing bank gives a customer a card and extends credit or holds the deposit, while an acquiring bank signs up the merchant. Visa sits between them with VisaNet, which it describes as a single connection point for moving money to many endpoints through different form factors. The company continues to invest in generative artificial intelligence, stablecoins and what it calls agentic commerce, in which software acts on a consumer’s behalf.

Fraud control is part of the product. In 1993 Visa was the first to apply neural network technology to payments to reduce card fraud, and in 2004 it began scoring the risk of every transaction in real time. The Zero Liability policy, introduced in 2001, protects cardholders from liability for fraudulent charges. In 2014 it also introduced Visa Checkout, an online payment option for shoppers. Its mobile payments platform launched in 2008, when the mobile phone began to act as a payment device.

Corporate structure and operations of Visa

Visa is listed on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol V and reports on a fiscal year that ends on September 30. In fiscal 2025 its net revenue grew 11 percent from $35.9 billion to $40.0 billion, driven by growth in processed transactions, cross-border volume and payments volume, partly offset by higher client incentives. Net income was $20.1 billion and diluted earnings per share were $10.20.

Operating expenses rose 30 percent to $16.0 billion, mainly because of a higher litigation provision and higher personnel costs. During fiscal 2025, 329 billion payments and cash transactions with Visa’s brand were processed by Visa or other networks, an average of 901 million a day.

The company grew its workforce from about 31,600 in fiscal 2024 to about 34,100 in fiscal 2025, an 8 percent increase, with employees in 86 countries and territories. More than 60 percent are located outside the United States.

Impact of Visa

Visa helped turn the credit card from a limited product for a few customers into a global payment method. Its early systems for authorization and settlement showed that a single network could connect thousands of banks. Today it works under a patchwork of national rules. In Europe, for example, a regulation limits interchange rates within the European Economic Area, requires Visa Europe to separate card scheme activities from processing, and limits network exclusivity.

Security remains a central issue. Visa says it analyzes transactions for risk in real time to reduce fraud. Card fraud also includes schemes such as phishing, in which criminals trick people into revealing account details, which no network tool can fully prevent.

Criticism and legal matters

Visa and Mastercard have faced merchant complaints about interchange fees, the fees that merchants’ banks pay to cardholders’ banks on card purchases. In fiscal 2025 Visa recorded additional accruals of $2.2 billion to address claims in the interchange multidistrict litigation, a group of related cases brought together in a United States federal court, and it made additional deposits of $875 million into its U.S. litigation escrow account.

The merchants allege that the card networks and banks conspired to set interchange fees in violation of antitrust law. Complaints of this kind were first filed in 2005, and Visa has described funding the U.S. litigation escrow account under what it calls its retrospective responsibility plans. The final outcome and amounts remain uncertain, and courts will decide the claims.

Editorially reviewed by Specialty Digest Editorial TeamLast reviewed November 4, 2026Researched and drafted with AI assistanceReport an issue