FIS Says Issuer Deal On Track Amid UK Regulator Questions

FIS said Friday (Oct. 10) that its planned acquisition of Global Payments’ Issuer Solutions business remains on track despite the company’s need to refile information with a U.K. regulator.

“In the normal course of the UK Competition and Markets Authority’s (CMA) review of the transaction, the company proactively identified additional information that it will be providing to the CMA, resulting in a need to refile the UK Merger Notice,” FIS said in a Friday press release.

The company said in the release that it still expects the transaction to close at the time it previously announced, in the first half of 2026.

In the CMA’s Friday update on its inquiry into the anticipated acquisition by FIS of TSYS, which is Global Payments’ Issuer Solutions business, the regulator said it rejected the parties’ merger notice because it failed to provide “the prescribed information.”

“As a result, the above statutory timetable ceases to apply,” the CMA said, referring to a table that showed Nov. 14 as the deadline for its phase 1 decision. “The CMA will restart its formal investigation once a complete merger notice has been provided to the CMA.”

PYMNTS reported April 17 that this was one of two “sweeping transactions” announced that day by FIS and Global Payments.

Global Payments said it sold its Issuer Solutions business to FIS for $13.5 billion and simultaneously bought Worldpay for a net price of $22.7 billion. Worldpay is co-owned by FIS and private equity firm GTCR.

FIS announced the same day that it would divest its remaining stake in Worldpay to Global Payments for $6.6 billion, speeding up the monetization of its minority holding.

In that announcement, FIS CEO and President Stephanie Ferris said: “The acquisition of Issuer Solutions is a strategic and accretive transaction that will expand FIS’ payment product suite,” adding that it replaces a “non-cash generating” minority stake with growing recurring revenues and cash flow.

PYMNTS reported at the time that the tens of billions of dollars changing hands in the acquisitions, and the roster of familiar names, recalled the megamergers of 2019, when Global Payments acquired Total System Services for about $22 billion, Fiserv and First Data merged for roughly the same price, and FIS took Worldpay that same year for $43 billion.

The CMA is also conducting an inquiry into the anticipated acquisition by Global Payments of Worldpay. The deadline for a phase 1 decision in that merger inquiry is Nov. 11.