Global Payments’ $24B Worldpay Deal With FIS & GTCR Tied To $13.5B Issuer Solutions Sale

As online payments and digital transactions grip even more people and businesses, financial technology companies strive to offer enhanced and dedicated services.

Leading global digital payment, digitization, and fintech provider Ant International recently launched World Card, an all-in-one digital cross-border payment and treasury account service for global businesses. This added to a partnership the firm struck with creative software provider Adobe to offer optimized payment experiences and tailored digital marketing solutions.

Of course, this is only one of the major moves made by fintech firms in the past few days.

Now, Global Payments, a leading worldwide provider of payment technology and software solutions, announced a three-way deal with financial services company FIS and private equity firm GTCR.

This includes definitive agreements that will seeGlobal Payments acquire Worldpay from GTCR and FIS for $24.25 billion, which includes a net purchase price of $22.7 billion and $1.55 billion in anticipated tax assets. On the flip side, Global Payments will divest its Issuer Solutions to FIS for $13.5 billion, which includes a net purchase price of $12 billion and $1.5 billion in anticipated tax assets.

This reflects a 12.3x adjusted EBITDA multiple for Issuer Solutions and an 8.5x adjusted EBITDA multiple for Worldpay.

FIS will receive $6.6 billion in pre-tax value for its stake in Worldpay, which represents the company’s total stake of 45%, as opposed to GTCR’s 55%—which the company acquired in July 2023.

The two deals within the three companies will occur simultaneously, where the divestiture of Issuer Solutions will include a cash transaction and FIS’ stake in Worldpay, and the remaining stake in Worldpay will be acquired from GTCR for a combination of cash and stock in Global Payments. Furthermore, GTCR will receive shares in Global Payments priced at $97, representing approximately. 15% of Global Payments’ outstanding shares.

Global Payments is expected to raise the financing using cash proceeds from Issuer Solutions’ sale, along with cash on the balance sheet and new debt raised.

The transactions are expected to close in the first half of 2026, and are subject to regulatory approvals, other customary closing conditions, and customary cash, debt, and working capital adjustments.

Just FYI, FIS stands for Fidelity Information Services, and GTCR stands for Golder, Thoma, Cressey, Rauner, despite the partners responsible for the renaming in 1984 splitting up in 1998.


As both Global Payments and Worldpay provide highly complementary payments, software, and commerce enablement solutions, the combined solution will gain extensive global reach and scale—serving over 6 million customers across around 94 billion transactions spanning a volume of $3.7 trillion in more than 175 countries.

Furthermore, it will position the company as a leading pure-play merchant with solutions focused on SMB customers, while diversifying its business, capabilities (including operating models), and customer base.

In addition to a wide range of added significant value creation, the partnership will also see Global Payments and FIS establish a commercial relationship to bring a comprehensive suite of solutions, which includes core banking, treasury management, embedded commerce, issuer processing, risk and fraud, and merchant solutions to partners on a global basis.

“Today marks a defining day for Global Payments and a pivotal milestone in our journey to become the worldwide partner of choice for commerce solutions,” said Cameron Bready, CEO of Global Payments.

“Global Payments and Worldpay bring together highly complementary capabilities and distribution networks, creating significant opportunities for the combined business to accelerate growth, amplify investment in innovation, and elevate client and partner experiences with best-in-class solutions,” added Bready.

Global Payments also published a presentation outlining how the move will benefit the company, following a live conference call, with a replay of the audio webcast.


On the other side of the deal, FIS’ acquisition of Issuer Solutions is expected to strengthen its position as a globally scaled fintech leader for large financial institutions.

Issuer Solutions comes as a global market leader in credit processing across 75 countries, processing over 40 billion transactions annually, and has strong partnerships with 170+ financial institutions and corporates.

In addition to being highly complementary to FIS’ current banking and payments business, the deal will expand FIS’ market opportunities, strengthen its financial profile, and help it gain enhanced revenue and cost synergies.

“The acquisition of Issuer Solutions is a strategic and accretive transaction that will expand FIS’ payment product suite and deepen our relationships with financial institutions and corporate clients,” said Stephanie Ferris, CEO and President of FIS. “Issuer Solutions’ globally scaled credit processing capabilities are highly complementary to FIS’ established debit processing capabilities, strengthening our broader banking and capital markets offering.”

FIS plans to fund the acquisition using $8 billion of new debt and money received from the sale of its stake in Worldpay.

Do you think this tridirectional acquisition deal will benefit Global Payments, as well as FIS and GTCR? Do you think it will inspire its competitors to make similar moves?

Let us know in the comments below!