万事达：数据与信任的护城河——与CEO迈克尔·米尔巴赫的炉边谈话洞见

Harshita Rawat, CFA+1 917 344 8485harshita.rawat@bernsteinsg.com Viola Chen+1 917 344 8614viola.chen@bernsteinsg.com Simran Ratani+1 917 344 8329simran.ratani@bernsteinsg.com Price Target Mastercard: The data and trust moat. Insights from our firesidechat with CEO Michael Miebach We hosted Mastercard’s CEO Michael Miebach for a fireside chat recently. Key topicsdiscussed included Value-added Services (the flywheel and data-driven moat), tokens as afoundational layer, the opportunity in Agentic Commerce and also growth of Stablecoins,runway in Consumer Payments, and finally, the vertical opportunity in Commercial and NewFlows. In the details section, we discuss our insights from the conversation. Investment Implications Mastercard has underperformed the market by 20% this year and 37% in the past year -largely because of the funding short dynamics for the AI trade and lack of meaningful positiverevisions. As we highlighted inour recentnote, MA’s growth algorithm is changing-while cash to card will still drive 8-9% volume/transaction growth, Value-added services(~40% of revenue) will increasingly drive growth. Mastercard vs. Visa?Mastercard’s is now trading at 24x NTM PE vs. Visa at 23x. MA’srelative valuation vs. Visa is now in the bottom decile 10yr range. While some historicaldrivers of MA’s outperformance vs. Visa are no longer relevant (e.g., MA’s Europe share gainstriggered by V’s Europe acquisition, MA’s fintech early lead, MA’s early investments in VAS) -we do note that MA continues to enjoy better geo exposure (e.g., US and UK are likely ~50%of V’s revenue vs. 35-40% for MA), and also has a greater opportunity for margin expansion.Taking a step back, we also believe we are at that moment in time where MA is simply facingunique headwinds e.g., COF-DFS, Trip.com loss, slightly higher exposure to ME - vs. Visaenjoying FIFA/Olympics tailwind. At the beginning of the year, we had a strong preference for Visa over Mastercardgiven our expectations around narrowing of the growth delta, Visa’s accelerated productvelocity and momentum in stablecoin-linked cards.Given the narrowing of the multiplepremium, we no longer have a strong preference.While MA still has to navigate MEheadwind in its guide (where it likely has a slightly higher exposure vs. Visa), looking into2027, MA’s growth outlook likely is similar to that of Visa’s. We are closely watching theimpact from recent reorganization, new VAS drivers, and stablecoin strategy post BVNK. DETAILS KEY INSIGHTS FROM OUR CONVERSATION WITH MASTERCARD’S CEO, MICHAEL MIEBACH THE DATA ‘MOAT’ IN VALUE-ADDED SERVICES (~40% OF MA’S REVENUES) •MA’s payment volumes fuel a very rich, global data set, which in turn help drive its curated set of services’ growth.~60% of services are network-linked and span pre (e.g. authentication, identity), during (tokenization, fraud prevention) andpost the transaction (e.g. disputes and analytics). •Cybersecurity is a key growth area, and could become more important with the advent of AI-driven fraud. MA’scompetitors (outside of payments) don’t have the dataset Mastercard sees. MA’s recent acquisition,Recorded Future, hashelped further strengthen Mastercard’s capabilitiesby combining external threat intelligence with its internal data forbetter prediction and mitigation of fraud. •In its marketing, loyalty and personalization solutions(e.g., Marketing Services, Personalized Platforms, Digital Insightsand Managed Services, and the new Mastercard Commerce Media), Mastercard has the transaction data that differentiates itfrom disparate competitors. •An underappreciated point is also around how Mastercard gains share vs. domestic schemes because of the services arounda transaction. We note that Mastercard’stransaction-linked yield has been steadily growing, implying incrementalityof services. •The remaining 40% of services, while not linked to the payment network, leverage Mastercard’s rich data set to deliverconsulting and analytics to their clients. Overall, value-added services help Mastercard drive growth and reinforce the valueof its core payment network. •As a reminder, MA’s last disclosed during its Investor Day in 2024 that its VAS portfolio consists of1) Security Solutions(~40% of VAS; primarily network-linked and highly recurring), e.g., Safety and Security, Identity Management andCybersecurity and Resiliency solutions,2) Business and Market Insights(~20% of revenue; network linked andengagement based), which includes Payment operations, Consulting, Analytics and Insights’ solutions,3) ConsumerAcquisition and Engagement(~teens% of revenue; engagement and platform-based), which includes Marketing Services,Loyalty and Personalization services,4) Other Services (>20%of revenue; network linked and highly recurring) e.g.,Authentication, Digital Gateway and Processing services, and5) Other Solutions(~6-7% of revenue; linked to non-card;highly recurring), which includes Real-time payments, Bill payments, Cross-border ser