MA

Mastercard does what Visa does: it routes and settles payments without ever lending or issuing a card. Revenue rose 16% in 2025, with gross volume up 15%, cross-border volume up 15% and switched transactions up 10%. Operating margin is 57.6%, and 59.2% on an adjusted basis — it has been above 55% for years, which is what an advantage that holds looks like. Value-added services grew 23%.

Why own both networks? Because this is not a duel but a duopoly: both benefit from the same shift out of cash, and the threat to one is the threat to the other. We size the pair as a single exposure, not as two ideas.

A word on execution, since the record shows it anyway. On 24 August our first order bought 79 shares of the wrong security — a Canadian namesake at $36.10 instead of Mastercard at $596. We caught it, liquidated at $35.98 and bought the right company the same day. Loss: 0.33% on the line. The error stays in the log; we do not remove things after the fact.

The risk is regulatory, as with Visa: network fee caps, domestic routing mandates, national switches.