PAYMENTS: DESCRIPTION

The Payments Practice Group focuses on transactional work for the electronic payments industry.  Having represented companies in the industry for more than 15 years, we have extensive experience with the issues that are most important to companies in the industry – whether they are financial institutions, issuers, acquirers, processors, outsourced service providers or vendors, and whether they are involved with credit and debit cards, gift cards, e-checks, corporate payments systems, ACH transactions or evolutionary technologies such as biometrics, contactless payments and mobile payments. 

 Our experience includes a wide variety of transactions and representations in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Germany, Ireland, Spain, Poland, Norway, Belgium and other jurisdictions.  The payments industry is characterized by rapid innovation and ever-increasing legal and regulatory complexity.  We pride ourselves on our comprehensive, up-to-date knowledge of industry trends and our practical, hands-on approach to addressing issues and solving problems particular to the payments industry.

The Payments Practice Group:

• consists of attorneys in the firm’s Atlanta and Brussels offices who each devote a substantial portion of their time to payments-related transactions and issues
• has represented a top five U.S. merchant acquirer since its inception
• includes a partner who spent a year in Dublin, Ireland as the dedicated on-site legal counsel for a top five European merchant acquirer
• understands the legal and regulatory environment applicable to international electronic payments organizations and, as a result, is able to deliver commercially sensible, results-oriented advice and service to acquirers and issuers
• represents a top ten U.S. financial institution in its efforts to grow its various payments businesses, both organically and through acquisition, in Europe

Representative Experience

Strategic Alliances
The Payments Practice Group has formed and managed (and, in some cases, dissolved) more than 100 strategic alliances with financial institutions and third party providers, including:

• Wachovia (and its predecessor, First Union)
• KeyCorp
• U.S. Bank
• MBNA
• Certegy 
• Regions Bank (and its predecessors, AmSouth and Union Planters)
• Union Bank of California

Securities/Public Company Transactions 
The Payments Practice Group represented NOVA Information Systems in the following public company transactions:

• its $2.1 billion merger with a leading national bank 
• its $1.2 billion acquisition of a Nasdaq-listed merchant acquirer 
• its $450 million acquisition of a top merchant acquirer

We also represented a leading merchant acquirer in connection with its initial public offering and secondary offering, and in connection with its 1934 Act reporting obligations as a public company.

International Business Expansion and Consolidation
The Payments Practice Group has assisted a top ten U.S. financial institution in exporting its payments business to Canada and Europe – including the acquisition of both bank portfolios and third party processors, the establishment of strategic alliances and the consolidation of newly-acquired businesses across Europe.  Engagements include:

• the acquisition of a major European acquiring portfolio, which included significant operations in Germany, the U.K., Poland and Belgium
• the acquisition of a significant acquiring portfolio in the U.K.
• the formation of a joint venture with an Irish bank and the subsequent buyout of the bank’s interest in that joint venture, which included interests in Ireland and the U.K.
• additional strategic acquisitions and alliances in Spain, Poland and Norway
• assisting three U.S.-based corporate payments businesses to export their business model and operations to various countries in the European Union

Card Association and Regulatory Compliance
The Payments Practice Group has actively managed the impact of bank and credit card association rules and relationships on payments businesses in the U.S. and Europe, including:

• qualifying two European credit institutions as full members of VISA and MasterCard
• concluding acquiring relationships in the U.S. with each of American Express and Discover
• negotiating an exclusive franchise arrangement with American Express for Ireland
• establishing, de novo, a licensed banking institution in Ireland and qualifying it on a pan-European basis, the principal purpose of which is to support several international payments business lines of a top ten U.S. financial institution