Judge signals approval for Visa and Mastercard’s $38 billion swipe fee settlement

A U.S. judge gave preliminary approval on Tuesday, June 9, to Visa and Mastercard’s $38 billion settlement with merchants over interchange fees. For PSPs, acquirers, and banks, the useful part is not the courtroom drama: the deal sketches out where card acceptance economics could move if the settlement survives final approval.

1. The judge said the settlement was “fair, reasonable, and adequate” and indicated he was likely to approve it, Reuters reported. The agreement was announced in November and is meant to resolve a court battle that has run for two decades.
2. The case started in 2005, when businesses accused Visa, Mastercard, and larger banks of colluding in violation of U.S. monopoly laws through interchange fees, also known as “swipe fees,” which merchants pay to process card transactions.
3. Under the settlement, Visa and Mastercard would reduce interchange fees by 0.1 percentage points for five years, cap standard consumer rates at 1.25%, allow merchants to choose whether to accept U.S. cards in certain categories, and give merchants more freedom to impose surcharges on credit card users.
4. The Electronic Payments Coalition (EPC), which represents credit unions, community banks, and payment card networks, said the agreement guarantees lower processing rates and other concessions worth more than $200 billion over eight years. EPC Executive Chairman Richard Hunt called it “a guaranteed win for Main Street.”
5. Not every merchant group agrees. The Merchants Payments Coalition called the fee reduction “miniscule,” and said in November that Visa and Mastercard would be able to raise fees without restrictions once the temporary cuts expire. In December, the National Association of Convenience Stores and the National Retail Federation filed complaints opposing the settlement. An earlier settlement offer was rejected in 2024, which led to the newer proposal.

For high-risk merchants, the practical point is that card acceptance rules can change without the merchant changing processors. When fee caps, surcharge rights, and category-by-category acceptance choices move, the downstream work lands on acquirers and PSPs first: pricing models, routing logic, and merchant communications all have to catch up.