Investing.com - Mastercard (NYSE:MA) reported on Wednesday a sharp drop in net profit in its third quarter earnings release, as the coronavirus pandemic resulted in customers spending less on its cards.
Mastercard announced earnings per share of $1.6, down 26% from last year, on revenue of $3.84 billion, a drop of 14%. Analysts polled by Investing.com anticipated EPS of $1.66 on revenue of $3.96 billion.
The drop in revenue was driven largely by travel declining sharply during the pandemic, with the company reporting a decline in cross-border volume of 36% on a local currency basis
The company's stock dropped 4.1% premarket, cutting into the 6% gain that the stock has made since the beginning of the year.
“Mastercard has been focused on helping merchants, banks, fintechs, governments and consumers with products and services to navigate the pandemic. We are seeing encouraging progress in the trajectory of domestic spending, while travel spending remains a challenge,” said Ajay Banga, Mastercard CEO. “Meanwhile, we are winning new business in core payments and are making real progress with our digital solutions, differentiated service offerings and multi-rail capabilities.”
During the third quarter of 2020, Mastercard repurchased approximately 6.5 million shares at a cost of $2.1 billion and paid $402 million in dividends.
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