Related Party Transactions

3 Months Ended

Mar. 31, 2024

Related Party Transactions [Abstract]

Related Party Transactions

Related Party Transactions

A portion of the Company’s business is conducted through merchant alliances between the Company and financial institutions. A merchant alliance is an agreement between the Company and a financial institution that combines the processing capabilities and management expertise of the Company with the visibility and distribution channel of the financial institution. A merchant alliance acquires credit and debit card transactions from merchants. The Company provides processing and other services to the alliance and charges fees to the alliance based on contractual pricing.

To the extent the Company maintains a controlling financial interest in an alliance, the alliance’s financial statements are consolidated with those of the Company and the related processing fees are treated as an intercompany transaction and eliminated in consolidation. To the extent the Company has significant influence in, but not control of, an alliance, the Company uses the equity method to account for its investment in the alliance. As a result, the processing and other service fees charged to merchant alliances accounted for under the equity method are recognized in the Company’s consolidated statements of income primarily as processing and services revenue. Such fees totaled $40 million and $46 million for the three months ended March 31, 2024 and 2023, respectively. No directors or officers of the Company have ownership interests in any of the alliances. The formation of each of these alliances generally involves the Company and the financial institution contributing contracts with merchants to the alliance and a cash payment from one owner to the other to achieve the desired ownership percentage for each. The Company and the financial institution enter into a long-term processing service agreement, which governs the Company’s provision of transaction processing services to the alliance. The Company had approximately $38 million of amounts due from unconsolidated merchant alliances included within trade accounts receivable, net in the Company’s consolidated balance sheets at both March 31, 2024 and December 31, 2023.