NEW YORK (AP) – Credit and debit card processor Visa Inc. said its fiscal third-quarter earnings fell 76 percent from a year ago, largely due to the cost of completing its purchase of its operations in Europe.
San Francisco-based Visa said it earned a profit of $412 million, or 17 cents per share, down from $1.7 billion, or 69 cents per share, in the same period a year ago. The results included several one-time items, but the largest one was a $1.9 billion charge related to the ending of a framework agreement between Visa and Visa Europe.
Excluding those one-time charges, Visa earned 69 cents per share, 2 cents above the 67 cents that analysts had been looking, according to FactSet.
“While little has changed in the global economic environment, and cross-border commerce continues to be challenged by a strong U.S. dollar, domestic consumer spend across the globe remains strong and resilient,” said Visa CEO Charlie Scharf in prepared remarks.
Visa processed $1.347 trillion in purchases on its network in the quarter, up 10.2 percent from a year ago, excluding currency fluctuations. Visa’s payment processing volume is closely watched by investors since Visa takes a small slice of every transaction as a fee.