Mastercard Inc., Visa Inc. and other financial institutions have agreed to settle a long-running antitrust lawsuit with merchants over the fees they pay when they accept card payments for a proposed settlement amount of about $6.2 billion.
As The Wall Street Journal reports, the proposed amount includes $900 million from all of the defendants, including a number of banks that issue debit and credit cards, including JPMorgan Chase, Citigroup Inc., and Bank of America Corp. It also includes roughly $5.3 billion already paid by the defendants as part of a $7.25 billion settlement reached in 2012.
Visa’s share of the new settlement is $600 million, which it said it set aside for the settlement on June 28. Including the 2012 settlement money, Visa’s share is $4.1 billion.
Mastercard has agreed to pay an additional $108 million on top of the $790 million it had agreed to pay in a settlement in 2012.
The merchants also allege that the card networks have intentionally set fees and card acceptance rules that primarily benefit the banks. The merchants argue that they want the ability to negotiate their own fees directly with the banks instead of through card networks like Visa and Mastercard, which settle the fees with the banks independently.
The defendants involved in the case said that part of the suit that seeks to revise network rules isn’t covered by today’s settlement and won’t result in any immediate action while the parties engage in negotiations.
