Visa is to pay $2.1 billion to its credit card rival American Express to settle damages relating to a 2004 antitrust lawsuit. The Visa International Service Association or VISA of San Francisco, California, USA, commonly called VISA, is an economic joint venture of 21,000 financial institutions that issue and market Visa products including credit and debit cards.
The settlement, believed to be the largest amount ever paid to resolve an antitrust matter, was announced yesterday. It comes nearly three years after the Supreme Court ruled that Visa and MasterCard had violated antitrust rules by barring their member banks from offering their customers credit cards that could be used on rival payment networks.
The agreement resolves American Express’s claims against Visa’s members, including some of the industry’s biggest issuers, like JPMorgan Chase, Capital One, Washington Mutual and Wells Fargo. Visa will pay American Express $945 million now and an additional payment by the end of next March, its statement said. It will then pay American Express $70 million each quarter until the full settlement is paid.
