TSG (The Strawhecker Group), an analytics and intelligence firm in the payments industry, has worked with payments companies to compile the industry’s most comprehensive resource on merchant acquirers.
Collectively, the companies highlighted process over 95% of all card payment volume in the US.
Looking at the top-ranked companies, JPMorgan Chase & Co. ranks first for estimated US total processing volume at $2.4 trillion, and first for estimated US total transactions at 46.2 billion. Stripe ranks first for estimated US total number of merchants at nearly 3.8 million.
This data is highlighted in TSG’s 2024Directory of U.S. Merchant Acquirers, which features over 11,000 data points on more than 300 companies, covering national leaders to regional ISOs.
Using the directory as a guide, TSG has published new insights on the country’s merchant acquiring landscape below.
- The top five players processed an estimated $7.5 trillion in payment card volume in 2023. All five players have a strong bank sales channel, as they are either bank-owned or have bank partners/clients from other areas of their business.
- Over 60% of the volume represented in the directory is processed by these top five players, and almost 90% of the volume represented in the directory is processed by the top 25 listed players
- Looking at the top-ranked companies, JPMorgan Chase & Co. ranks first for estimated US total processing volume at $2.4 trillion and total transactions at 46.2 billion. Stripe ranks first for estimated US total number of merchants at nearly 3.8 million.
- Authorize.net (a Visa solution) is the payment gateway with the most partnerships among the acquirers listed, partnering with 42% of these players, a similar percentage as last year
- 38% of the players listed sell Fiserv’s Clover point-of-sale products. This is up from 35% of providers that listed Clover as an available smart POS offering.
- Only Square and Stripe have over 3 million domestic clients, though micro-merchants in those figures may not perform strongly for these players
- With its focus on restaurants, Toast continues to amass a considerable market share, registering as the 15th largest provider by payment card volume
- Wells Fargo continues to be the most utilised sponsor bank, at nearly 27% market share in terms of relationships
- 43% of all providers directly market the existence of a surcharging or cash discounting/dual pricing program
FAQs
The top merchant acquirers in the United States consisted of Chase and Fiserv - a conglomerate that includes Citi, Santander and BBVA, among others - in 2023. Based on total purchase transactions, both two companies had a number of over 37 billion.
Who are the top 5 merchant acquirers? ›
These merchant acquirers were led by the five largest U.S. owners based on transactions—Worldpay, First Data, Chase Merchant Services, Bank of America Merchant Services, and Global Payments.
Who is the world's largest merchant acquirer? ›
Looking at the top-ranked companies, JPMorgan Chase & Co. ranks first for estimated US total processing volume at $2.4 trillion and total transactions at 46.2 billion. Stripe ranks first for estimated US total number of merchants at nearly 3.8 million.
Who is the largest payment processing company? ›
Top 10 Companies in Payment Processing Solutions Market in 2022
- Payment Processing Solutions Market Overview. ...
- Top Leading Companies in the Payment Processing Solutions Market: Top 10 By Revenue. ...
- Google – Revenue [US$256.7 Billion] ...
- Visa Inc. – ...
- PayPal Holdings Inc. – ...
- Mastercard Incorporated – Revenue [US$18.88 Billion]
Examples of successful serial acquirers include Constellation Software (CSU), TransDigm (TDG), Heico (HEI), Danaher (DHR) and Illinois Tool Works (ITW), all of which have outperformed the S&P 500 over the last 15 years.
Who are merchant acquirers? ›
A merchant acquirer (or else, acquirer or acquiring/merchant bank) is the financial institution or acquiring bank licensed by the major card schemes (e.g. Mastercard or Visa) to accept credit or debit card payments for merchants.
Who are the top acquirers of the Nilson report? ›
Vantiv, First Data, Chase, Bank of America, and Global Payments (includes a full year of Heartland) ranked as the top five U.S. acqu...
Who is Square's merchant acquirer? ›
Square is a payment card aggregator (often referred to as PSP - payment service provider) utilizing Chase Paymentech as an acquiring bank. So to answer your question more directly - Square pays Chase to process transactions on the merchants behalf.
Who is the top merchant acquirer in the Middle East? ›
Biggest merchant acquirers in MEA 2017-2022, based on number of transactions. Acquirers from South Africa, the UAE and Saudi Arabia were responsible for 80 percent of Visa and Mastercard transactions in the MEA region in 2022.
Who is Amazon's merchant acquirer? ›
Worldpay Becomes First Acquirer to Enable Amazon Pay.
Credit card networks
- American Express. This credit card network offers the world's largest global payment network. ...
- Discover. The Discover Global Network operates in over 200 countries and territories with a reach of more than 345 million cardholders. ...
- Mastercard. ...
- Visa.
In simple terms, an acquirer acts as the bridge between the merchant and the payment network, ensuring that electronic payments are processed smoothly and securely. Without acquirers, merchants would not be able to accept electronic payments and would be limited to cash transactions only.
Who is the market leader in payment processing? ›
In August 2024, PayPal continued to dominate the market for online payment processing technologies worldwide, holding a market share of 45 percent. Coming in second place was Stripe with a market share of approximately 17 percent.
Who are the biggest players in the payments industry? ›
The backbone of the payment industry is the card brands - Visa, Mastercard, American Express, and Discover - they are responsible for the networks that connect all the players.
What is the most used payment system in USA? ›
Take credit cards, a major payment method in the US. Cards are still the most-used payment method, with American Express, Mastercard, Visa as large global card schemes.
Who are acquirers entrepreneurs? ›
Acquisition entrepreneurship. What's acquisition entrepreneurship? It's a form of business that harnesses the power of synergy. It's the pursuit of success that, instead of creating something out of nothing, creates something more and something new out of what's already there.
Who are the largest merchant acquirers in the UK? ›
The five largest acquirers – by number and value of card transactions – are Barclaycard, Elavon, Global Payments, Lloyds Bank Cardnet and Worldpay.
How do acquirers make money? ›
An acquirer charges a merchant varying fees which are detailed in their agreement. Most acquirers charge a per-transaction and monthly fee. The acquirer's per-transaction fees cover the costs associated with network processing. Monthly fees may also be charged to cover various other servicing aspects of the account.
What is acquiring volume? ›
Gross Acquiring Volume means processed and non-processed acquired Volumes (including domestic and international retail purchases, cash transactions, on-us transactions, intra-processor transactions and local use only transactions) that occur as a result of one or more of (A) a transaction involving any one of the ...
