Marqeta TPV Grows 53% as BNPL Volumes Double, Travel Spending Snaps Back

Consumers have continued to spend using cards.

Buy now, pay later (BNPL) has become less a novelty than a firmly entrenched payment method.

Those trends continued to be in evidence in Marqeta’s most recent earnings results, where spending via Block (formerly Square) helped boost several key metrics.

In the latest supplemental filings that accompanied earnings, the company said that quarterly total processing volumes were up 53% to $37 billion.  That’s higher than forecasts in the most recent quarterly commentary, which had estimated that TPV would grow by 40% through the rest of the year.

Jason Gardner, CEO, said that the 53% growth rate in TPV was notable given the fact that the prior period had been boosted by government stimulus payments.

“The main drivers of growth we saw throughout 2021 are still intact. Consumers continue to trust neobanks to manage more and more aspects of their financial lives,” he said.

BNPL and corporate travel continue to see momentum, he said. BNPL volumes doubled from the year ago period. Management said on the call that established financial institutions are looking to get into this market, where Marqeta can provide those FIs with purpose-built solutions.

Newer Customers Grow Faster

Newer customers signed in 2019 contributed more than 20% of the company’s growth in the quarter — and are growing at five times the rate seen before the pandemic.

Block continued to represent a smaller percentage of the company’s top line, according to management, at 66%, where it had been 73% a year ago.

“We now have four customers with TPV greater than $100 million in Q1, twice as many as we had at this time last year,” he said.

In discussion of card issuance, Gardner said that these firms have to balance risk and growth — and to that end, Marqeta has launched Risk Control, a product suite that helps risk management processes.

Looking ahead, Gardner said that, “We’ll seek to always add banking-as-a-service offerings where we think it makes sense for our customers.”

Crypto he said, still remains a growth vertical, as the company’s platform, according to the call “acts as a gateway between fiat and cryptos … when consumers want to go and spend those assets at the point of sale.”