Mastercard Unveils Buy Now, Pay Later Program

Payment solutions provider Mastercard (MA) has unveiled a Buy Now, Pay Later (BNPL) program, Mastercard Installments, to offer more choices to customers.

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The program will allow banks, lenders and fintech companies to offer flexible payment options to consumers. This option will be offered without integration into the merchant infrastructure.

Mastercard Installments will enable customers to access BNPL offers digitally either through instant approval during checkout, or pre-approved through their lender’s mobile banking application. Pre-approved installments can be used on a merchant’s website directly, while instant approvals during checkout can be accessed through Click-to-Pay.

Chief Product Officer at Mastercard, Craig Vosburg, said, “Mastercard Installments has been built on our guiding principles to protect consumers and enable choice without sacrificing trust and security.” (See Mastercard stock charts on TipRanks)

Initially, the program will be launched in the U.K., the U.S., and Australia. The company has partnered with Latitude and Loyalty for the launch of Mastercard Installments in Australia, and with Synchrony (SYF), SoFi (SOFI), Marqeta (MQ), Huntington (HBAN), Fidelity (FIS), Fifth Third (FITB), Galileo (GLEO) and Barclays (BCS) in the U.S.

Following the announcement of the company’s second-quarter financial results on July 29, Wells Fargo (WFC) analyst Donald Fandetti reiterated a Buy rating on the stock, and raised his price target to $440 from $430 (25.3% upside potential).

In a research note to investors, the analyst said, “A key Q2 earnings highlight was the notable ramp-up in card-present travel spend growth.”

Overall, the stock has a Strong Buy consensus rating, based on 15 Buys and one Hold. The average Mastercard price target of $439.94 implies 25.3% upside potential. Shares have gained 4.4% over the past year.

According to TipRanks’ Smart Score rating system, Mastercard scores a 7 out of 10, suggesting that the stock is to perform in line with market averages.