GMS/WorldPay Sold to Advent and Bain
- RBS chose the capital-investment funds, Advent International and Bain Capital, to purchase 80% of its Global Merchant Services (GMS) activity, which includes the acquirer WorldPay. The transaction should cost 2.4 billion euros (2.03 billion pounds), and seems to be coherent with previous estimations. RBS will retain about 20% of shares in WorldPay.
- The two acquirers intend to develop WorldPay’s activities and also plan to make other acquisitions in this sector. Of the three final potential acquirers, only one investment fund (Clayton, Dubilier & Rice) was not already established in the card industry. Advent, however, detains 51% of the American processor Fifth Third Bancorp since 2009 and Bain takes part in the management of NXP Semiconductors.
- WorldPay is a major e-PSP on a worldwide scale, covers 40 countries, and is number one in Europe in terms of cross-border acquisition. The European competition authorities required RBS bank to cease a certain number of activities, among which GMS, but also the British Williams & Glyn branches network (sold to Santander).
- For the past few months, the acquisition world has been witnessing a centralisation movement. This can be explained by the acceleration in terms of SEPA implementation, which encourages cross-border acquisition.