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Visa (NYSE:V) and Mastercard (NYSE:MA) will prolong the limits on tourist card fees established five years ago with the European Union antitrust regulators, extending them for an additional five years until 2029, the European Commission said Friday, Reuters reported.
In 2019, the companies agreed to a 0.2% fee cap on non-EU debit card payments and a 0.3% fee cap on credit card payments to resolve an EU antitrust probe.
“Inter-regional interchange fees for debit and credit card transactions under these schemes will remain capped for another 5 years until November 2029,” the Commission said in a statement, Reuters reported.
For online transactions, fee limits will remain 1.15% for debit cards and 1.5% for credit cards.
Intercharge fees, often referred to as swipe fees, are established and imposed by Visa (V) and Mastercard (MA) on merchants that accept their debit and credit cards. Such charges provide income for banks and other entities that issue cards.
In the U.S., a $30B antitrust settlement between the two card companies and U.S. merchants to limit credit-card swipe fees had been rejected last month by a federal judge.