Payments giant Visa said that despite the omicron variant of COVID, the war in Ukraine and rising inflation, it still had a pretty good fiscal quarter. Payment volumes grew 17% during the quarter, despite the company pulling out of Russia (as many companies did at the beginning of the war), which represented 4% of its net revenue. The company said that a lot of this growth happened because of international transactions rebounding during the quarter.
Still, Visa wasn’t immune to costs going up for some things like staff amid the global worker shortage. Expenses tied to personnel went up 10% for the company.
Key comments:
“We had a very strong quarter amidst the invasion of Ukraine and our decision to suspend operations in Russia,” CEO Al Kelly said. “The Omicron variant impacts were short-lived and the global economic recovery that began in the middle of last year continued.”
“Effective immediately, Visa will work with its clients and partners within Russia to cease all Visa transactions over the coming days,” read a statement Visa put out in early March. “Once complete, all transactions initiated with Visa cards issued in Russia will no longer work outside the country and any Visa cards issued by financial institutions outside of Russia will no longer work within the Russian Federation.”
