While Global Payments' US$24.25 billion acquisition of Worldpay from FIS and FIS's US$13.5 billion response acquisition of Global Payments' issuer solutions have dominated headlines, the sheer volume of deals in the payments space speaks for itself.
Current market:
- Consistently high M&A activity levels
We are seeing:
Payment service providers deploy the full gamut of growth strategies:
- Mergers (e.g., Moka & United Payment)
- Mega acquisitions (e.g., Global Payments' acquisition of Worldpay)
- Bolt-on acquisitions (e.g., Fiserv's acquisitions of 49.9% of AIB Merchant Service and CCV)
- Joint ventures (e.g., Mastercard's partnerships with PayPal, Deutsche Bank, EGBANK, Chainlink, MoonPay, Jeel / Riyad Bank, NatWest and Argyle)
Private capital appetite remains strong for participation in fundraisings at all stages:
Early-stage:
- Cusp Capital (€10 million investment in Payflow)
- Project A (participation in US$8.5 million funding round in Mimo)
- Mouro Capital (participation in £5 million Seed funding round in Burbank)
Series B / C:
- Elephant VC (participation in US$78 million Series B funding round in Sipay)
- Jump Capital (participation in US$41 million Series B funding round in Navro)
- Endeit Capital (participation in US$37 million Series B funding round in Nomupay)
Late-stage:
- Vitruvian (US$190 million investment in Dojo)
- Penta Capital (US$30 million investment in CellPoint Digital)
- Accel (participation in US$267 million Series F funding round in Zepz)
Private equity focuses acquisition firepower on:
- Payment RegTech (e.g., Carlyle's majority acquisition of SurePay and Bridgepoint's acquisition of Eckoh)
- Payment solutions (e.g., Arcapita's consortium's acquisition of NEOPAY and Investcorp's acquisition of Epipoli)
- Emerging markets payment infrastructure (e.g., SPE's acquisition of OMOA)
Key drivers / challenges:
Availability of high-quality opportunities—first movers:
- Cash-out of early-bird investments (e.g., Adenia's disposal of OMOA)
- Cash-out of liquid stakes (e.g., Poste Italiane's disposal of 3.78% of Nexi)
- Partner with established payment infrastructure providers (e.g., AIB's disposal of 49.9% of AIB Merchant Service)
Competition in the payments space intensifies (even further). Market participants seek:
- Consolidation of local market positions (e.g., 360 Payment Solutions' acquisitions of TSI Plus and José Miguel López)
- Delivery of innovative customer experience (e.g., myPOS's acquisitions of UTP Group and Toporder and Stripe's acquisition of Lemon Squeezy)
- Expansion of geographical reach (e.g., Ebury's and Peach Payments' respective acquisitions of ArcaPay and PayDunya)
Trends to watch:
Availability of non-core assets from larger payment institutions:
- Streamlining operations (e.g., Paysafe's disposal of direct marketing business)
- Reshaping strategic focus (e.g., Global Payments' disposal of issuer solutions business)
- Banks preferring partnership models in the payments arena (e.g., Deutsche Bank, Santander UK, Barclays, Citi and Standard Chartered all inked payments partnerships in the last 12 months)
Our M&A forecast
High levels of M&A activity will continue—no shortage of appetite for scale, scope and innovation on the buy-side, and no shortage of non-core assets from established banks (migrating to partnership models) and from larger PSPs (in the aftermath of mega acquisitions).
Payments – Publicly reported deals & situations
High appetite and deep pockets
Market commentary:
94.6% of all eligible in-store card transactions in the UK were made using contactless in 2024, rising from 93.4% in 2023 (Finextra-April 2025).
Debit cards have overtaken cash as the favoured payment method among consumers in Switzerland (Finextra-March 2025).
PE / VC — equity investments:
- Cusp Capital: Participation in €10 million funding round in Payflow (June 2025)
- Vitruvian Partners: US$190 million equity investment in Dojo (May 2025)
- EdenBase, GPOS Investments, Pembroke VCT, Sidebyside, and Ingenii VC: Participation in £5.7 million Series A funding round in Ryft (April 2025)
- Elephant VC and QuantumLight: Participation in US$78 million Series B funding round in Sipay (April 2025)
- Jump Capital, Bain Capital Ventures, Motive Partners, and Unusual Ventures: Participation in US$41 million Series B funding round in Navro (April 2025)
- Project A, Northzone, and Seedcamp: Participation in US$8.5 million funding round in Mimo (March 2025)
- Hanaco Ventures, Fuel Ventures, IDC, and Outward VC: Participation in £37 million investment round in Curve (March 2025)
- Renew Capital: Equity investment in NjiaPay (March 2025)
- Mouro Capital, Anthemis, and Portfolio Ventures: Participation in £5 million Seed funding round in Burbank (March 2025)
- Algebra Ventures and Quona Capital: Participation in US$6.75 million Seed funding round in enza (March 2025)
- Maven Capital Partners: Participation in Series A funding round in Kani Payments (February 2025)
- Endeit Capital and Uneti Ventures: Participation in US$37 million Series B funding round in Nomupay (January 2025)
- Addition, Greyhound, and Lightrock: Participation in €60 million funding round in Satispay (November 2024)
- Toscafund and Penta Capital: US$30 million equity Investment in CellPoint Digital (November 2024)
- Accel, Leapfrog, and TCV: Participation in US$267 million Series F funding round in Zepz (October 2024)
- Molten Ventures and 83North: Participation in US$220 million Series C funding round in Form3 (September 2024)
- Altos Ventures, Fintech Collective, FJ Labs, Avenir Growth, Y Combinator, and Jabbar Internet Group: Participation in US$22 million Series A funding round in Ziina (September 2024)
- Galaxy Ventures and Accomplice: Participation in US$10.7 million series A funding round in Layer2 Financial (August 2024)
- Union Square Ventures, Ribbit Capital, and Slow Ventures: Participation in US$15 million series A funding round in Sling Money (August 2024)
- Acrew Capital, DST Global Partners, Norrsken22, HOF Capital, Amplo, and NYCA Partners: Participation in US$40 million Series A funding round in Nala (July 2024)
- Argentem Creek Partners: Participation in US$13.5 million series A extension funding round in dopay (July 2024)
PE—acquisitions:
- Carlyle Group: Acquisition of majority stake in SurePay (June 2025)
- Arcapita: Consortium acquisition of majority stake in Neopay (January 2025)
- Investcorp: Acquisition of majority stake in Epipoli (January 2025)
- Bridgepoint Advisers: Acquisition of Eckoh (October 2024)
- SPE Capital: Acquisition of OMOA (August 2024)
- Aurum Partners: Acquisition of significant stake in Sokin (July 2024)
Institutional—acquisitions / equity investments:
- HSBC: Strategic investment in Token.io (June 2025)
- UBS, Citi, and NatWest: Participation in funding round in Icon Solutions (June 2025)
- Goldman Sachs and Barclays: Participation in US$220 million Series C funding round in Form3 (September 2024)
Government funding:
- British Business Bank: Participation in £5.7 million Series A funding round in Ryft (April 2025)
Payment Giants:
- Visa Ventures: Equity investment in BVNK (May 2025)
- Visa: Equity investment in Mynt (April 2025)
- Fiserv: Participation in US$150 million funding round in Melio (October 2024)
- Mastercard: Participation in US$220 million Series C funding round in Form3 (September 2024)
UHNW:
- Lord Stanley Fink: Participation in £37 million investment round in Curve (March 2025)
Inorganic growth of market players
Market commentary:
One in three Britons made contactless payments via phone each month in 2023, while transactions in cash fell as consumers continued to turn away from using it as a spending tool (Financial Times, July 2024).
TerraPay, Airtel, bKash, MPESA, Nequi, and Sama Money formed the 'Wallet Interoperability Council' aimed at facilitating interconnection in cross-border transactions across Bangladesh, Colombia, Kenya, Senegal, Tanzania, and Uganda (Finextra, August 2024).
Finland, Sweden, Norway, Denmark, and Estonia are developing offline card payment systems to avoid outages if online services are knocked out (Finextra, May 2025).
Sweden's push to become a cashless society is rapidly reversing, as the Swedish Central Bank submits proposals to introduce an obligation to accept cash in the sale of essential goods (Finextra, May 2025).
Mergers:
- Moka & United: Payment, Merger (June 2025)
Acquisitions
- Xero: Acquisition of Melio (June 2025)
- PayRetailers: Acquisition of Celeris (June 2025)
- Fiserv: Acquisition of 49.9% of AIB Merchant Service (June 2025)
- Peach Payments: Acquisition of PayDunya (June 2025)
- DLocal: Acquisition of AZA Finance (June 2025)
- Grenke: Acquisition of B2F (June 2025)
- Lemonway: Acquisition of PayGreen's business (June 2025)
- Qenta: Acquisition of Pipit Global (May 2025)
- Nayax: Acquisition of Inepro Pay (April 2025)
- Global Payments: Acquisition of Worldpay (April 2025)
- FIS (Fidelity National Information Services): Acquisition of Global Payments' issuer solutions business (April 2025)
- IFX Payments: Acquisition of Argentex (April 2025)
- Fiserv: Acquisition of CCV (March 2025)
- Payglobe: Acquisition of 60% of Moneynet (March 2025)
- Rapyd: Acquisition of PayU (March 2025)
- myPOS: Acquisition of UTP Group (March 2025)
- PayU: Acquisition of 43.5% of Mindgate Solutions (March 2025)
- Numia: Acquisition of BCC POS (February 2025)
- Retex: Acquisition of Konvergence (February 2025)
- Paycorp: Acquisition of Pilot Software (February 2025)
- KORT Payments: Acquisition of Paysafe Direct (February 2025)
- Shift4: Acquisition of Global Blue (February 2025)
- Market Pay: Acquisition of Altapay (February 2025)
- Margeta: Acquisition of TransactPay (February 2025)
- eMag and HeyBlu: Acquisition of Orange Money (January 2025)
- Ebury: Acquisition of ArcaPay (January 2025)
- MoonPay: Acquisition of Helio (January 2025)
- Dgpays: Consortium acquisition of majority stake in Neopay (January 2025)
- MyPOS: Acquisition of Toporder (January 2025)
- United Payment: Acquisition of majority stake in Turan (January 2025)
- Stitch: Acquisition of ExiPay (January 2025)
- Sokin: Acquisition of Settle (December 2024)
- 360 Payment Solutions: Acquisition of Tsi Plus (October 2024)
- 360 Payment Solutions: Acquisition of José Miguel López (October 2024)
- Mastercard: Acquisition of Minna Technologies (October 2024)
- Tarabut: Acquisition of Vyne (September 2024)
- Stripe: Acquisition of Lemon Squeezy (July 2024)
- Ant Group / Antom: Acquisition of MultiSafepay (July 2024)
JVs:
- Mastercard: Payments, One Credential JV with PayPal (June 2025)
- Mastercard: Merchant solutions, JV with Deutsche Bank (June 2025)
- Visa: FDIC-insured debit cards, JV with Klarna (June 2025)
- Visa: Physical cards JV with Zilch (June 2025)
- Nomupay: Payments, Strategic partnership with SB Payment Service (June 2025)
- MoneyGram: Remittance, International money transfers JV with tiqmo (June 2025)
- Ant International: Cross-border payment, Cross-border payments solutions JV with Deutsche Bank (June 2025)
- Worldpay: Merchant services, Merchant services JV with Santander UK (June 2025)
- Western Union: Remittance, Cross-border money transfer services JV with UK Post Office (June 2025)
- Visa: Sustainable finance, Carbon tracking JV with Bank al Etihad and ecolytiq (June 2025)
- Mastercard: Payments, Digital payment services JV with EGBANK (June 2025)
- Mastercard: Crypto asset purchase, Crypto assets purchase JV with Chainlink (June 2025)
- Worldpay: Stablecoin payments, Stablecoin payments JV with BVNK (May 2025)
- Volante Technologies: Payments, payments infrastructure JV with Arion Bank (May 2025)
- Adyen: Payments, Electric vehicle payments JV with Paythru (May 2025)
- Mastercard: Payments, Stablecoin payments JV with MoonPay (May 2025)
- Wise: Payments, Cross-border payments JV with Raiffeisen Bank International (May 2025)
- Mastercard: Crypto wallet, Crypto debit cards JV with Kraken (April 2025)
- Mimo: Embedded funding, Embedded funding JV with Froda (March 2025)
- Ripple: African crypto-enabled cross-border payment, Crypto payments JV with Chipper Cash (March 2025)
- Al Etihad Payments: Co-branded cards, UAE co-badged cards JV with UnionPay International (March 2025)
- Telr: E-commerce and payments, Digital commerce payments JV with Apaya (January 2025)
- Checkout.com: UAE payments, UAE payment solutions JV with noqodi (January 2025)
- Visa: B2B travel payments, B2B travel payments JV with Qashio (January 2025)
- Fiserv: Payments, Payments and e-commerce JV with Unicaja (January 2025)
- Kameo: Payments, Open banking payments JV with Neonomics (December 2024)
- Mastercard: Payments, Saudi Arabia Card-as-a-Service and Bank-as-a-Fintech JV with Jeel / Riyad Bank (December 2024)
- Alipay+: Payments, Cross-border mobile payments JV with İşbank (December 2024)
- Worldline: Payments, Italy merchant acquiring JV with Credem (November 2024)
- Mastercard: B2B mobile virtual card payment, Approval2Buy JV with NatWest (November 2024)
- Ingenico: Payments, Crypto payments JV with Lunu Pay (November 2024)
- Wise: Payments, Cross-border payments JV with Standard Chartered (November 2024)
- Checkout.com: Payments, Digital payments JV with Zing (November 2024)
- TerraPay: Payments, Italian cross-border payments JV with Fabrick (October 2024)
- MeaWallet: Digital cards, Corporate digital cards JV with Toqio (October 2024)
- Mastercard: Consumer lending, Open Banking for lending JV with Argyle (August 2024)
- Revolut: Card transfers, Card transfers JV with Visa (August 2024)
- Mastercard: Payments, Card-to-card payments JV with Ampere (August 2024)
- Karma Wallet: Insurance claims processing, Insurance claims JV with Palomar (July 2024)
- GoCardless: Direct debit solutions, Direct debit services JV with Airwallex (July 2024)
- Worldline: Digital payments / BaaS, BaaS JV with BKN301 (July 2024)
- Nexi: Payments, Bancomat Pay JV with Amazon.it (July 2024)
- Visa: Crypto wallets, Crypto payments JV with Tangem (July 2024)
Payment solution providers stockpile growth capital
- Token.io: Successful investment from HSBC (June 2025)
- Payflow: Successful €10 million funding round led by Cusp Capital (June 2025)
- Icon Solutions: Successful funding round led by UBS (June 2025)
- Dojo: Successful US$190 million equity investment from Vitruvian Partners (May 2025)
- BVNK: Successful investment from Visa Ventures (May 2025)
- Mynt: Successful equity investment from Visa (April 2025)
- Ryft: Successful £5.7 million Series A funding round led by EdenBase (April 2025)
- Sipay: Successful US$78 million Series B funding round led by Elephant VC (April 2025)
- Navro: Successful US$41 million Series B funding round led by Jump Capital (April 2025)
- Next Generation: Successful US$5 million Seed funding round (April 2025)
- Mimo: Successful US$8.5 million funding round led by Project A (March 2025)
- Curve: Successful £37 million investment round led by Hanaco Ventures (March 2025)
- NijaPay: Successful investment from Renew Capital (March 2025)
- Burbank: Successful £5 million Seed funding round led by Mouro Capital (March 2025)
- enza: Successful US$6.75 million Seed funding round led by Algebra Ventures and Quona Capital (March 2025)
- Kani Payments: Successful Series A funding round led by Maven Capital Partners (February 2025)
- Nomupay: Successful US$37 million Series B funding round led by Endeit Capital (January 2025)
- Flatpay: Successful €57.6 million Series C funding round (December 2024)
- Satispay: Successful €60 million funding round led by Addition, Greyhound and Lightrock (November 2024)
- CellPoint Digital: Successful US$30 million equity investment from Toscafund and Penta Capital (November 2024)
- Zepz: Successful US$267 million Series F funding round led by Accel (October 2024)
- Melio: Successful US$150 million funding round led by Fiserv (October 2024)
- Arab Financial Services: Successful US$50 million financing (October 2024)
- Form3: Successful US$220 million Series C funding round led by Goldman Sachs (September 2024)
- Ziina: Successful US$22 million Series A funding round led by Altos Ventures (September 2024)
- Layer2 Financial: Successful US$10.7 million Series A funding round led by Galaxy Ventures (August 2024)
- Sling Money: Successful US$15 million Series A funding round led by Union Square Ventures, Ribbit Capital and Slow Ventures (August 2024)
- Nala: Successful US$40 million Series A funding round led by Acrew Capital (July 2024)
- dopay: Successful US$13.5 million Series A extension funding round led by Argentem Creek Partners (July 2024)
Early birds cash-out
- Poste Italiane: Disposal of 3.78% of Nexi (February 2025)
- Adenia Partners: Disposal of OMOA (August 2024)
Banks opt for partnership model?
Market commentary:
In a digitized financial landscape, traditional banks are facing an imperative to transform their payment infrastructures, driven by customer expectations and competition from digital-first challengers (PYMTS - June 2025).
JVs:
- Deutsche Bank: Merchant solutions JV with Mastercard (June 2025)
- Deutsche Bank: Cross-border payment solutions JV with Ant International (June 2025)
- Santander UK: Merchant services JV with Worldpay (June 2025)
- EGBANK: Digital payment services JV with Mastercard (June 2025)
- Barclays: Payments business JV with Brookfield Asset Management (as part of Barclays' exit strategy) (April 2025)
- Unicaja: Payments and e-commerce JV with Fiserv (January 2025)
- Riyad Bank / Jeel: Saudi Arabia card-as-a-service and bank-as-a-fintech JV with Mastercard (December 2024)
- isbank: Cross-border mobile payments JV with Alipay+ (December 2024)
- Standard Chartered: Cross-border payments JV with Wise (November 2024)
- Intesa Sanpaolo: Digital payments JV with Visa (November 2024)
- Santander: Open banking payments JV with Token.io (October 2024)
- UBS: Disposal of 50% of Swisscard to American Express (October 2024)
- Citi: Cross-border debit card payments JV with Mastercard (October 2024)
- Emirates NBD: Blockchain-based payments JV with Partior (October 2024)
- Doha Bank: Cross-border payments JV with Nium (October 2024)
- TBC Bank Uzbekistan: Uzbek payments and money transfers JV with Visa (October 2024)
- TBC Bank Uzbekistan: Uzbek payments JV with Mastercard (October 2024)
Minority disposals:
- AIB Group: Disposal of 49.9% of AIB Merchant Service (June 2025)
Debt facilities:
- European Investment Bank: Provision of €220 million debt facility to Nexi (September 2024)
Acquisitions:
- Okto Bank: Acquisition of majority stake of U4C (January 2025)
- National Bank of Kuwait: Acquisition of 51% of uPayments (December 2024)
- Sovcombank: Acquisition of Rocket Fintech Platform (November 2024)
- Morgan Stanley Expansion Capital: Acquisition of significant stake in Sokin (July 2024)
White & Case means the international legal practice comprising White & Case LLP, a New York State registered limited liability partnership, White & Case LLP, a limited liability partnership incorporated under English law and all other affiliated partnerships, companies and entities.
This article is prepared for the general information of interested persons. It is not, and does not attempt to be, comprehensive in nature. Due to the general nature of its content, it should not be regarded as legal advice.
© 2025 White & Case LLP
