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| MasterCard Processing |
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 MasterCard
Worldwide is an American multinational corporation with its
headquarters in Purchase, New York. Throughout the world,
its principal business is to process payments between the
banks of merchants and the card issuing banks or credit
unions of the purchasers who use the "MasterCard" brand
debit and credit cards to make purchases. MasterCard
Worldwide has been a publicly traded company since 2006.
Prior to its initial public offering, MasterCard Worldwide
was a membership organization owned by the 25,000+ financial
institutions that issue its card.
MasterCard, originally known as MasterCharge, was created by
several California banks as a competitor to the
BankAmericard issued by Bank of America, which later became
the Visa credit card issued by Visa Inc. The original banks
behind MasterCharge were United California Bank (later First
Interstate Bank and subsequently merged into Wells Fargo
Bank), Wells Fargo, Crocker National Bank (also subsequently
merged into Wells Fargo), and the Bank of California
(subsequently merged into the Union Bank of California). |
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