Mastercard Explores Divestiture of Nets Real-Time Payments Unit

Mastercard is reportedly looking to divest much of the real-time payments business it acquired from Denmark’s Nets Group in 2019, marking a significant strategic pivot away from certain European instant payment infrastructures and towards emerging digital asset opportunities. The potential sale, initially reported by The Financial Times, indicates a renewed focus on high-growth areas such as stablecoin infrastructure.

The 2019 acquisition for approximately $3.2 billion was Mastercard’s largest at the time, aimed at enhancing its account-to-account and instant payment capabilities, particularly within the Nordic region and broader Europe. The deal encompassed Nets’ Corporate Services business, including its real-time payment infrastructure, clearing and e-billing solutions. Now, Mastercard plans to unwind this deal by selling off the real-time payments unit, while maintaining its broader “multi-rail” strategy that increasingly integrates digital assets.

This strategic re-evaluation appears to be driven by a confluence of factors, primarily the intensifying competitive and regulatory landscape in European real-time payments, which has pressured economic returns and diminished the unit’s centrality to Mastercard’s long-term growth.

Simultaneously, Mastercard has been aggressively expanding its footprint in the digital assets space. A prime example is its recent anticipated acquisition of stablecoin infrastructure provider BVNK, valued at up to $1.8 billion by 2026. Divesting the Nets unit could free up capital and management bandwidth, allowing Mastercard to channel resources into strategically aligned, higher-growth assets like BVNK and other on-chain payment capabilities.

Investors and analysts largely view the BVNK deal as an extension of Mastercard’s multi-rail strategy into programmable, on-chain payment infrastructure, cross-border treasury, and stablecoin settlement, which are areas perceived as offering greater growth potential and defensibility compared to some legacy instant payment infrastructures.

PYMNTS has extensively covered Mastercard’s deepening involvement in the digital economy and its multi-rail approach. Recent coverage has highlighted the company’s various initiatives in open banking, cross-border payments innovation, and its efforts to integrate blockchain technology into its core offerings. This move to potentially divest the Nets assets aligns with Mastercard’s evolving strategy to navigate a rapidly changing payments landscape, prioritizing innovation in digital assets and stablecoins as key drivers for future growth.