Was MasterCard's Q3 good or bad?

Filed under: Earnings reports, American Express (AXP), MasterCard Inc'A' (MA), Visa Inc. (V)

I've said on many occasions that I prefer MasterCard (NYSE: MA) to Visa (NYSE: V). No, I don't mean the card products themselves. I mean the stocks. I believe Visa has better brand equity associated with it, and I think it possesses a little more depth and fundamental prowess. However, both of these companies operate on the same basic economic model: collect fees on transactions, and don't take on loan risk. So, both MasterCard and Visa do offer compelling long-term investment theses.

And, even though there were some negative outlooks on MasterCard's latest earnings report, which was released Tuesday, I have to say that I didn't find the situation too disturbing. Revenues increased only 2%. The top line was inhibited by currency effects, but it's not like we haven't heard that story before. More importantly, MasterCard posted adjusted income of $3.48 per share, representative of a 40% increase over the adjusted income recorded a year ago.

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Was MasterCard's Q3 good or bad? originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Wed, 04 Nov 2009 08:20:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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