1975
In 1975 the DOJ ended exclusivity between Visa and MasterCard, allowing banks to belong to both networks, which is called duality.
“That does happen in 1975, and so this concept of duality takes hold for the banks.”
Topic
Mastercard
41 facts from 9 episodes, in date order. These are what speakers said on the shows, each linked to the moment it was said. They aren't independently verified.
2010
Adi Ignatius says Mastercard was risk-averse when Ajay Banga became its leader, which he believes was in 2010.
“MasterCard, as you wrote, was a risk-averse organization when Ajay Banga took over in, I think, 2010.”
2021
Mastercard rearchitected its network about five years before this interview.
“we five years ago, we rearchitected Mastercard's network.”
2022
U.S. merchants paid an estimated $93 billion in Visa and MasterCard credit card fees, per the Nielsen Report, up from $33 billion in 2012.
“U.S. merchants paid an estimated $93 billion in Visa and MasterCard credit card fees last year, according to the Nielsen Report”
2024
Lukas Biewald says Recorded Future announced it was being acquired by Mastercard for $2.65 billion.
“you announced that, uh, you you were getting acquired by by Mastercard for $2.65 billion”
2024
Ahlberg says Mastercard's payments data could reveal whether stolen credit cards were used, which would help trace the criminal supply chain behind them.
“we get our hands on a stolen credit card, it would be awfully interesting to know whether that card has been used or not”
2024
Mastercard acquired the threat intelligence company Recorded Future in December 2024.
“through, um, a company that we've acquired in December 2024, Recorded Future, we scan the world out there”
2025
Atlan held a customer conference featuring speakers from Workday, Mastercard and Virgin Media O2.
“we just got off our customer conference. And we had some phenomenal customers, customers like Workday and Mastercard and Virgin Media O two”
2025
Sankar said Mastercard's chief data officer described an agentic governance framework and that over one third of its products are AI-first.
“they're building an agentic governance framework for, uh, you know, Very cool, as they have over, uh, one thirds of their products are AI first products today.”
2025
Sankar quoted Mastercard's chief data officer as saying the company is actually a data company rather than only a finance company.
“you would think we're a we're a finance company, but we're actually a data company.”
2025
Michael Miebach said Mastercard's network handled about 160 billion transactions in the prior year.
“Uh, last year, we were about 160 billion transactions through our network, so it does provide quite a unique view.”
2025
Mastercard saw 3.9% year-over-year growth in spending over the 2025 holiday season.
“the uh past holiday season, 3.9% was the year over year growth.”
2025
Apparel sales grew 7.8% in the 2025 holiday season, according to Mastercard data.
“So apparel sales had a real moment, so 7.8% growth in apparel, um, really a stick out kind of category.”
2025
Michael Miebach said about half of the 3.9% holiday growth came from price increases.
“you were to say, is that inflation? No, it's about half is price increases, so pretty tame.”
2026
About two thirds of transactions on Mastercard's global network are contactless.
“about two thirds of global transactions on our network are now contactless.”
2026
Bussmann says agentic payments being developed by Visa and Mastercard are probably the first agent-to-agent use case, and they depend on verifying that the agent is legitimate.
“I think the the, uh, agentic payment topic that Visa and Mastercard working is is the maybe the first one.”
2030
Mastercard committed that every transaction will be tokenized by 2030, starting in Europe.
“we made a commitment that, uh, starting with Europe, that by twenty thirty, every transaction will be tokenized.”
Undated
JoAnn Stonier helped Mastercard become compliant with the European Union's General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) while she was its chief privacy officer.
“I helped, um, the company become GDPR compliant, which really was, I think, uh, the moment in time when many, many companies were coming to the place where they needed to operationalize a lot of data risk.”
Undated
Mastercard uses a process called privacy by design to build privacy and security into its products.
“We had a whole process called privacy by design. We still use that process.”
Undated
Mastercard's data teams check early model outputs for model drift and accuracy, so input inequities are not amplified.
“we're gonna be looking for the model drift. We're gonna be looking to see is this an accurate output?”
Undated
Stonier says data can be restricted by contract or by its type, such as financial data, which constrains how Mastercard may use it.
“Can we not use the data because it's contractually restricted, or it's restricted because it's a certain type of data, it's financial data, right?”
Undated
Stonier's team at Mastercard includes people with both law and engineering degrees, who translate between business, technical and regulatory domains.
“I have lawyers and engineers on my team, right? They have both degrees.”
Undated
Stonier gives designing a look-alike fraud model that uses only synthetic data as an example of a constraint-driven data challenge.
“the outcome is to design a look-alike model for fraud that only utilizes, you know, synthetic data, right?”
Undated
Mastercard uses a specific framework for ethical AI and is applying it to different contexts.
“So we have a very specific framework that we're using around ethical AI, but then we're really getting into the nitty-gritty around different kinds of context.”
Undated
Sam Ransbotham says Mastercard chooses projects by strategic focus rather than choosing a project in order to do AI.
“they are picking projects based on their strategic focus rather than picking a project to do AI.”
Undated
Fradin says comScore's pitch worked once it offered specific answers, such as Visa's market share against Mastercard in Japan.
“we can tell you the market share for Visa versus Mastercard versus others in Japan. Turns out Visa really wants to know that.”
Undated
Mastercard processes payments across about 220 countries and territories.
“we facilitate payments all around the world, so that that provides a really interesting data set, um, across all sectors, across all countries, 220 countries and territories.”
Undated
Michael Miebach said contactless payment took about ten years to reach its current level of adoption.
“It took ten years for, uh, contactless to get what it is today.”
Undated
Tokenization replaces card data with a one-time code usable only for a single transaction, as described by Michael Miebach.
“So you take your card data and you turn it into a one-time code that can only be used for that transaction.”
Undated
Michael Miebach said Mastercard invested roughly $11 billion in safety and security over six years.
“we've invested, I think, over the last, uh, six years, like $11 billion into our safety and security.”
Undated
Mastercard Threat Intelligence took down 9,500 fake merchant sites in its first six months of market testing.
“In the first six months of market testing, we have taken down 9,500 fake merchant sites.”
Undated
Michael Miebach said Mastercard Threat Intelligence saved $150 million in fraud during early testing.
“We saved $150 million in fraud.”
Undated
Michael Miebach said Mastercard applies about 19 million rules to clean its data before extracting insights.
“We have like 19 million rules that we apply to sanitize our data and then start to extract insights from that.”
Undated
Michael Miebach said Mastercard Agent Pay addresses verifying that an AI agent is the accredited agent it claims to be.
“And that's problem number one to be solved, which we have solved, is Mastercard agent pay.”
Undated
Michael Miebach said financial services in Africa are mostly delivered through phone companies, which are Mastercard partners.
“In Africa, most of, uh, financial services are driven through, uh, the phone companies and they those are our partners.”
Undated
Bob Saffian said Mastercard has worked with OpenAI, Google and Cloudflare on agentic commerce standards.
“You've been working with OpenAI and Google and Cloudflare on agentic commerce standards.”
Undated
Hill says Ajay Banga and the board concluded that Mastercard faced an existential crisis because fintech was going to overtake it.
“He came in and he decided with the board that really Mastercard was facing an existential crisis. Fintech was going to overtake them”
Undated
Ajay Banga declared that Mastercard's purpose would be financial inclusion, which Hill says justified becoming a technology company.
“And he declared that the purpose was going to be financial inclusion.”
Undated
Hill says Ajay Banga directed Mastercard to spend half its time and resources on the core business and half on diversifying and growing new businesses.
“we're gonna spend 50% of our time on the core business, but 50% of our time and our resources, I should say, are gonna really be spent on diversifying the business and growing new businesses.”
Undated
Hill says an entrepreneur whose company Mastercard acquired created a series of innovation labs around the world to drive innovation.
“That individual, Gary, ended up creating a series of innovation labs around the world to help drive innovation.”
Undated
In researching her book, Paula Goldman spoke with HR leaders at companies including Seagate and Mastercard about internal mobility and workforce reinvention.
“I talked to someone at Seagate, and I talked to folks at Mastercard and elsewhere.”
Episodes
- 27 Nov 2023Visa3h 44m
- 27 Apr 2021Designing a Better Future: Mastercard’s JoAnn Stonier25m
- 21 Jul 2026AI Agents in Banking: UBS Former Chief Information Officer54m
- 17 Sep 2026How AI Is Changing Talent, Not Just Tasks: Rethinking Where Human Judgment Matters Most31m
- 3 Mar 2026The New Leadership Structures that Unblock Innovation31m
- 13 Jan 2026The AI agents in your wallet, with Mastercard CEO Michael Miebach29m
- 1 Dec 2025The $700 Billion AI Productivity Problem No One's Talking About58m
- 8 Apr 2025Inside the Dark Web, AI and Cybersecurity with Christopher Ahlberg CEO of Recorded Future50m
- 8 Jan 2026How Open Context Layers Help Enterprises Build, Govern, & Scale Agentic AI - with Prukalpa Sankar of Atlan24m