Mastercard Incorporated (MA) — Company Research

Last Updated: 27 September 2026

Mastercard's revenue growth has held in the mid-teens through the first half of 2026. Net revenue rose 14% to $9,277m in the quarter to 30 June 2026, value-added services grew 20%, and management raised its full-year outlook to low-teens net revenue growth. In August it completed the purchase of stablecoin infrastructure company BVNK and appointed a new Chief Financial Officer. The same months brought fresh objections from Walmart and about 1,000 merchants to the US interchange settlement, and litigation in the UK and Europe is still open. This report sets out what Mastercard's SEC filings and earnings releases show: revenue, earnings, cash flow, debt, insider dealing and scheduled events. Every valuation figure is shown as a calculation.

1. Company Snapshot

Field	Value
Company	Mastercard Incorporated, headquartered in Purchase, New York
Ticker / exchange	MA (Class A common stock), New York Stock Exchange
CEO / Leadership	Michael Miebach (President and Chief Executive Officer since January 2021); Ling Hai (Chief Financial Officer from 3 August 2026, succeeding Sachin Mehra, who became Chief Business Officer)
Employees	About 39,800 at 31 December 2025 (FY2025 Form 10-K), about 70% of them outside the US
Revenue (FY2025)	Net revenue $32,791m, up 16% year on year (15% currency-neutral)
Net income (FY2025)	GAAP $14,968m (diluted EPS $16.52); adjusted $15,415m (adjusted diluted EPS $17.01)
Revenue (trailing twelve months to 30 June 2026)	$35,083m
Market cap	~$497.3bn (876.0m Class A and Class B shares at 27 July 2026 × $567.65 close on 25 September 2026)
Gross dollar volume	$2.9 trillion in Q2 2026, up 8% in local currency; 47.4bn switched transactions, up 9%
Dividend	$0.87 a quarter ($3.48 annualised), last paid on 7 August 2026
Most recent reported period	Q2 2026 (quarter ended 30 June 2026), reported 30 July 2026

Live price action for MA and the wider payments sector can be followed on the ChartsView Live Charts page.

2. Bull Case and Bear Case

Bull Case

• Growth has held in the mid-teens: net revenue rose 16% in Q1 2026 and 14% in Q2 2026, after 16% for FY2025. Management raised its FY2026 outlook in July to net revenue growth in the low teens, from a range that started at the high end of low double digits.
• Value-added services are becoming a second engine: value-added services and solutions revenue was $13,315m in FY2025 (40.6% of net revenue, up 23%) and $3,826m in Q2 2026, up 20%. These fraud, data, authentication and processing services sell into the same bank and merchant relationships as the network.
• High margins and cash generation: GAAP operating margin was 60.2% in Q2 2026. Trailing operating cash flow was $17,437m against $1,462m of capital spending, and Mastercard bought back $8.9bn of shares in the first half of 2026.
• Cross-border volume is still growing fast: cross-border volume rose 12% in local currency in Q2 2026 and cross-border assessments rose 21% to $3,460m. July business updates showed cross-border growth of 11%.
• Positioned in stablecoins and agentic payments: the BVNK acquisition closed on 3 August 2026 and SoFi went live with stablecoin settlement on Mastercard's network on 22 September. Agent Pay tokenised credentials are being used by AI shopping agents, including a deal reported with Alchemy in September.

Bear Case

• Litigation is not finished: Walmart and about 1,000 merchants have objected to the US Rules Relief settlement, whose final approval hearing is on 16 November 2026. UK and European merchant and commercial-card claims total more than $2bn, and the UK liability appeal is not heard until February 2027.
• Legislative threat to credit routing: the Credit Card Competition Act was reintroduced in January 2026 and has been endorsed by the President. It would require large issuers to enable a second network on credit cards. An attempt to attach it to a housing bill failed on 13 March 2026, but the bill remains live.
• Rebates and incentives grow faster than assessments: rebates and incentives rose 22% to $5,997m in Q2 2026, faster than payment network revenue at 10%. Card issuers and merchants keep a growing share of the gross fees.
• Thin equity and rising debt: total debt rose to $24,643m at 30 June 2026 from $19,000m at the end of 2025, while stockholders' equity fell to $5,611m because buybacks exceed retained earnings.
• A high multiple and steady insider selling: the shares trade at ~31x trailing GAAP earnings and ~31x trailing free cash flow. Every insider transaction found in 2026 was a sale, including about $27.9m by the CEO between 31 July and 5 August.

3. Business Segments

Mastercard reports one operating segment but discloses net revenue in two categories. Payment network revenue is the assessments it charges on volume and transactions, less rebates and incentives paid to customers. In FY2025 gross assessments were: domestic $11,029m (+8%), cross-border $12,021m (+18%), transaction processing $15,930m (+17%) and other network $1,018m (+9%), against rebates and incentives of $20,522m (+16%).

Segment / category	% of revenue	What it is
Payment network	59.4% ($19,476m, +12%)	Fees based on gross dollar volume on Mastercard-branded cards, domestic and cross-border, plus switching (authorisation, clearing and settlement) and other network services, net of rebates and incentives
Value-added services and solutions	40.6% ($13,315m, +23%)	Security and fraud solutions, cyber intelligence (Recorded Future), consumer acquisition and loyalty, business and market insights, digital authentication, processing and gateway, account-to-account payments and open finance

4. Business Model and Moat

How it makes money. Mastercard does not lend money or issue cards. It runs the network connecting card-issuing banks, merchants' acquiring banks, merchants and cardholders, and charges fees based on the value and number of transactions. Revenue follows spending volumes, transaction counts and cross-border travel rather than credit losses or interest rates. Capital needs are small: FY2025 capital spending on property and capitalised software was $1,215m against $17,648m of operating cash flow.

Where the durable advantage sits. The moat is a two-sided network effect. Merchants accept Mastercard because cardholders carry it, and banks issue it because merchants accept it. The switching network, tokenisation (three in five European Mastercard e-commerce transactions are tokenised) and fraud-scoring data are expensive to replicate. Value-added services sell into the same bank and merchant relationships, which lifts revenue per transaction without new customers.

Where the model is fragile. The biggest threats come from courts, regulators and legislators rather than direct rivals. Interchange rules, routing mandates and competition cases in the US, UK and Europe can change pricing. Account-to-account payment systems and stablecoins could bypass card rails. Mastercard is responding by buying into those rails, through BVNK and its open-banking and account-to-account services.

5. Financial Health

All figures come from Mastercard's quarterly earnings releases and Form 10-K and 10-Q filings, cross-checked against its SEC XBRL data. The fiscal year is the calendar year. Adjusted EPS is Mastercard's own non-GAAP diluted EPS. The dividend column is dividends declared per share in the year; Mastercard raises the quarterly rate each December.

Fiscal Year	Revenue ($m)	YoY %	GAAP EPS	Adjusted EPS	Dividend/share	Long-term debt (YE)
FY2021	18,884	+23.4%	$8.76	$8.40	$1.81	$13,109m
FY2022	22,237	+17.8%	$10.22	$10.65	$2.04	$13,749m
FY2023	25,098	+12.9%	$11.83	$12.26	$2.37	$14,344m
FY2024	28,167	+12.2%	$13.89	$14.60	$2.74	$17,476m
FY2025	32,791	+16.4%	$16.52	$17.01	$3.15	$18,251m

† Revenue is net revenue, after rebates and incentives. FY2021 adjusted EPS is below GAAP EPS because Mastercard's non-GAAP measure excluded gains on equity investments that year. ‡ Long-term debt is the non-current portion at year end. The current portion was a further $792m at FY2021, $274m at FY2022, $1,337m at FY2023, $750m at FY2024 and $749m at FY2025. At 30 June 2026, current debt was $2,459m and non-current debt $22,184m, a total of $24,643m.

Cash generation and balance sheet: FY2025 operating cash flow was $17,648m, capital expenditure $1,215m (property and equipment $489m plus capitalised software $726m) and depreciation and amortisation $1,143m. GAAP operating income was $18,897m. For the twelve months to 30 June 2026, operating cash flow was $17,437m, capital expenditure $1,462m, depreciation and amortisation $1,195m and GAAP operating income $20,465m. At 30 June 2026, cash and equivalents were $11,291m and investments $318m, a total of $11,609m against $24,643m of debt. Net debt was therefore about $13.0bn, and Mastercard stockholders' equity was $5,611m.

Quarter / Half	Revenue ($m)	Adjusted EPS	GAAP EPS
Q2 2026	9,277	$5.04	$4.97
Q1 2026	8,398	$4.60	$4.35
Q4 2025	8,806	$4.76	$4.52
Q3 2025	8,602	$4.38	$4.34
Q2 2025	8,133	$4.15	$4.07
Q1 2025	7,250	$3.73	$3.59
FY2025 total	32,791	$17.01	$16.52

Q2 2026 net revenue rose 14% (12% currency-neutral). GAAP net income was $4,388m (+19%) and adjusted net income $4,453m (+18%). GAAP operating expenses rose 10% to $3,690m. For Q3 2026, management guided net revenue growth at the high end of low double digits and operating expense growth in the high single digits on a GAAP basis. For FY2026 it guided net revenue growth in the low teens.

6. Valuation Metrics

Raw metrics, September 2026. Not opinions on whether the stock is cheap or expensive.

Metric	Value
Market cap	~$497.3bn (869.5m Class A plus 6.5m Class B shares at 27 July 2026 × $567.65 close on 25 September 2026)
Trailing P/E (GAAP)	~31.2x (price $567.65 / trailing twelve-month GAAP diluted EPS $18.18, the sum of Q3 2025 to Q2 2026). On Mastercard's adjusted EPS of $18.78 over the same four quarters the multiple is ~30.2x
P/E (forward)	~29.4x (price $567.65 / $19.28, being H1 2026 adjusted EPS of $9.64 annualised). Mastercard does not guide EPS and ChartsView does not use consensus estimates, so this is a simple run-rate figure
P/S (TTM)	~14.2x (market cap $497.3bn / trailing net revenue $35.08bn)
Enterprise value	~$510.3bn (market cap $497.3bn + total debt $24.64bn − cash and investments $11.61bn, per the 30 June 2026 balance sheet)
EV/EBITDA (TTM)	~23.6x (EV $510.3bn / EBITDA $21.66bn; EBITDA = trailing GAAP operating income $20.47bn + depreciation and amortisation $1.20bn from the cash flow statement)
P/FCF	~31.1x (market cap $497.3bn / free cash flow $15.98bn; FCF = trailing operating cash flow $17.44bn − capital expenditure $1.46bn, including capitalised software)
52-week high	$601.23 intraday (25 August 2026)
52-week low	$464.52 intraday (3 June 2026)
Short interest (% of float)	~0.82% of float, being 7.20m shares short at the 15 September 2026 settlement date (MarketBeat); Yahoo Finance shows 0.83%
Days to cover	~3.2 days at the 15 September 2026 settlement date (MarketBeat); Yahoo Finance's short ratio is 2.7 days
Price/book	~88.6x (market cap $497.3bn / stockholders' equity $5.61bn at 30 June 2026). Equity is small because buybacks have exceeded retained earnings, so this ratio says little about value

Mastercard's Class B shares (6.5m) are convertible into Class A shares and are included in the market cap above. Excluding them would lower every market-cap-based multiple by under 1%.

7. What Are They Building

Payments for AI agents. Mastercard launched Agent Pay with agentic tokens on 29 April 2025 and extended it with Agent Pay for Machines on 10 June 2026, a protocol for machine-to-machine micropayments with more than 30 partners including Stripe, Adyen, Coinbase and Cloudflare. On 10 September 2026 Mastercard, Visa and Ant International announced a shared "Know Your Agent" framework under Singapore's BuildFin.ai platform. An AI shopping card from Alchemy using Agent Pay credentials was reported on 17 September.

Stablecoins and digital assets. Mastercard agreed in March 2026 to buy BVNK, a stablecoin payments infrastructure company, for $1.5bn plus up to $300m of contingent payments, and completed the deal on 3 August 2026. It also obtained a New York BitLicense for a US subsidiary this year. On 22 September 2026 SoFi became the first US national bank to settle card transactions in its own stablecoin, SoFiUSD, on Mastercard's network, moving a $25bn card programme.

Wallets and tokenisation. Mastercard Wallet Pay, launched on 9 September 2026, lets digital wallets, including those on Alipay+, be accepted across Mastercard's merchant network. Mastercard targets 100% tokenisation of e-commerce transactions in Europe by 2030.

Security and data services. The $2.65bn purchase of threat-intelligence company Recorded Future closed in December 2024 and now sits inside value-added services, alongside Merchant Trust Services, launched this year. Syria's first international card payment in more than 15 years was processed on Mastercard's network with Qatar National Bank in late August 2026, after US sanctions were eased.

8. Competitive Landscape

Market capitalisations were re-checked at the 25 September 2026 close (Finviz; Adyen from Yahoo Finance). Metrics come from each company's own full-year results release.

Peer	Market cap (September 2026)	Key 2025 metric
Visa (V)	~$685.9bn	Net revenue $40.0bn for the year to 30 September 2025, up 11% (Visa Q4 FY2025 release)
American Express (AXP)	~$208.6bn	2025 revenue net of interest expense $72.2bn, up 10% (American Express full-year 2025 release)
PayPal (PYPL)	~$47.1bn	2025 net revenue $33.2bn, up 4% (PayPal Q4 2025 release)
Block (XYZ)	~$45.9bn	2025 gross profit $10.36bn, up 17% (Block Q4 2025 shareholder letter)
Adyen (ADYEN, Euronext Amsterdam)	~€27.2bn	2025 net revenue €2,364m, up 18% (Adyen H2 2025 results)
Fiserv (FISV)	~$24.7bn	2025 GAAP revenue $21.19bn, up 4% (Fiserv full-year 2025 release)

Visa is the closest comparison: it runs the same four-party network model and is about $190bn larger by market value. American Express issues cards and runs its own network, so it carries credit risk that Mastercard does not. PayPal, Block, Adyen and Fiserv compete for merchant acceptance and wallet share but mostly process card payments that travel over the Visa and Mastercard networks.

9. Insider Activity

President and Chief Executive Michael Miebach sold about $27.9m of shares between 31 July and 5 August 2026 under a Rule 10b5-1 plan adopted on 3 November 2025, after exercising options. Former CFO Sachin Mehra and Chief Services Officer Linda Kirkpatrick also sold under plans. No open-market purchases by insiders were found in 2026. The table is compiled from SEC Form 4 filings.

Name	Date	Type	Shares	Price	Value	Plan Type
Sachin Mehra (Chief Business Officer)	02 Sep 2026	Sale	3,266	$584.00	~$1.91m	Rule 10b5-1 (adopted 6 May 2026)
Linda Kirkpatrick (Chief Services Officer)	31 Aug 2026	Sale	923	$593.54	~$0.55m	Rule 10b5-1 (adopted 4 May 2026)
Sachin Mehra (Chief Business Officer)	19 Aug 2026	Option exercise and sale	7,444	~$577.13	~$4.30m	Rule 10b5-1
Linda Kirkpatrick (Chief Services Officer)	17 Aug 2026	Sale	1,191	$565.24	~$0.67m	Rule 10b5-1
Michael Miebach (President and CEO)	05 Aug 2026	Sale	15,372	$575.00	~$8.84m	Rule 10b5-1 (adopted 3 Nov 2025)
Linda Kirkpatrick (Chief Services Officer)	04 Aug 2026	Option exercise and sale	4,280	~$570.31	~$2.44m	Rule 10b5-1
Michael Miebach (President and CEO)	03 Aug 2026	Option exercise and sale	16,628	$580.00	~$9.64m	Rule 10b5-1 (adopted 3 Nov 2025)
Michael Miebach (President and CEO)	31 Jul 2026	Option exercise and sale	16,628	$567.68	~$9.44m	Rule 10b5-1 (adopted 3 Nov 2025)

Edward McLaughlin, President and Chief Technology Officer of Mastercard Technology, also sold 19,800 shares after exercising options on 15 July 2026, about $10.6m, under a 10b5-1 plan. New CFO Ling Hai received a 2,657-share award on 3 August 2026. Most of these sales were planned in advance, so they carry less information about insiders' views than discretionary trades would.

10. Key Risks

• US interchange litigation: the damages-class settlement is final, but the Rules Relief settlement faces objections from Walmart and about 1,000 merchants ahead of its 16 November 2026 final approval hearing. Block and Intuit still claim more than $5bn of single damages in aggregate. Mastercard's accrued US litigation provision was $149m at 30 June 2026.
• UK and European claims: unresolved UK and pan-European merchant claims exceed £0.5bn, a UK commercial-card collective action exceeds £1bn, and a Portuguese consumer action of about €0.4bn goes to trial in October 2026. Mastercard lost on some liability issues in 2025 and its appeal is set for February 2027.
• Regulation of routing and fees: the Credit Card Competition Act would require a second network option on credit cards. The US Department of Justice is investigating Mastercard's debit programme, the European Commission is examining acquirer network fees, and Australia's regulator has a debit case pending judgment.
• Payment rails that bypass cards: account-to-account systems, real-time payments and stablecoins could take volume from card networks. Mastercard's own stablecoin and open-banking products may cannibalise higher-fee card transactions.
• Cross-border and macro sensitivity: cross-border assessments were $12,021m in FY2025 and grew faster than any other line. A travel shock, a strong dollar or a recession would hit the highest-margin revenue first.
• Leadership change and acquisition integration: a new CFO took office on 3 August 2026 alongside wider executive changes, and BVNK must be integrated into a regulated payments network.

11. Recent Developments

• 22 Sep 2026 — SoFi goes live with stablecoin settlement. SoFi became the first US national bank to settle a card programme on Mastercard's network in its own stablecoin, SoFiUSD, covering a $25bn card book. The same day Walmart, Circle K and other merchants argued in court filings that the card-fee settlement is unconstitutional.
• 17 Sep 2026 — Agent Pay used in an AI shopping card. The Wall Street Journal reported that Alchemy's AgentCard uses Mastercard Agent Pay tokenised credentials so AI agents can make purchases.
• 16 Sep 2026 — Last opt-out merchant cases settled. Visa and Mastercard settled the remaining opt-out interchange suits in the Grubhub-led group, including Belk, BJ's and Uline, before a September trial. Terms were not disclosed.
• 15 Sep 2026 — Merchants object to US settlement. Walmart and about 1,000 merchants filed objections to the Rules Relief class settlement, which received preliminary approval in June 2026. The final approval hearing is on 16 November.
• 09 Sep 2026 — Wallet Pay launched. Mastercard launched Wallet Pay to make digital wallets, including Alipay+ wallets, usable across its network. The next day it announced a "Know Your Agent" framework for AI agents with Visa and Ant International.
• 03 Aug 2026 — BVNK acquisition completed and new CFO. Mastercard completed the purchase of stablecoin infrastructure company BVNK, agreed in March for up to $1.8bn. Ling Hai took over as CFO the same day.
• 30 Jul 2026 — Q2 2026 results and raised outlook. Net revenue was $9,277m (+14%), adjusted EPS $5.04 (+21%) and GAAP EPS $4.97. Mastercard bought back 9.8m shares for $4.9bn in the quarter and raised its FY2026 revenue growth outlook to the low teens.

12. Key Dates to Watch

• Expected Oct 2026 — Q3 2026 results; date not yet announced. Mastercard reported Q3 2025 on 30 October 2025.
• Expected Oct 2026 — trial of the Portuguese consumer collective action against Mastercard; retirement of Vice Chair Tim Murphy.
• 16 Nov 2026 — final approval hearing for the US Rules Relief interchange settlement before Judge Brian Cogan.
• Expected Dec 2026 — board decision on the quarterly dividend and buyback; on 9 December 2025 it raised the dividend to $0.87 and approved a $14bn repurchase programme.
• 10 Feb 2027 — claim deadline for the $167.5m Visa and Mastercard ATM surcharge settlement, of which Mastercard's share is about $78.7m.
• Expected Feb 2027 — hearing of Mastercard's appeal on liability in the UK merchant interchange litigation.
• 17 Feb 2027 — final approval hearing for the ATM surcharge settlement.

Macro releases that move payments stocks, such as retail sales and consumer spending data, are listed on the ChartsView Economic Calendar. Reader discussion of these dates continues in the Forum.

---

Disclaimer: This research is produced by ChartsView for educational and informational purposes only. It does not constitute financial advice or a recommendation to buy or sell any security. All information is sourced from publicly available company filings, press releases, and official data. ChartsView does not use analyst opinions or third-party ratings. Always conduct your own due diligence and consider your personal financial situation before making investment decisions. Past performance is not indicative of future results.