The news: Visa and Mastercard reported strong growth in their most recent earnings.

• Visa’s net revenues increased 12% YoY in its Q4 2025 (ending September 30, 2025), per its earnings release.
• Mastercard’s net revenues grew 17% YoY in Q3 (ending September 30), per its earnings release.

How cardholders fared: Despite macroeconomic concerns, consumers are still spending.

• Visa’s credit card payments volume grew 9% YoY during the quarter, up from 5% a year ago. And its debit card payments volume jumped 10% YoY, versus 8% in Q4 2025.
• Mastercard’s credit and charge program volume increased 8.1% YoY, versus 9.3% in Q3 2024. Mastercard’s debit and prepaid volume grew 9.7% YoY, down from 11.1% a year ago.

Both discretionary and nondiscretionary spend in the US increased from the previous quarter, Visa CFO Chris Suh said on the company’s earnings call, with consumers showing “broad-based strength.”

What’s next? Visa and Mastercard are forecasting strong growth during the holiday season and over the next few quarters thanks in part to an extra lift from more affluent cardholders.

• While Visa’s card volume growth among all consumer spend bands remained relatively consistent on a quarterly basis, the highest band grew the fastest, per Suh. The network plans to enhance its affluent consumer payment offerings during the next fiscal year, which will likely include exclusive experiences for travelers going to the 2026 Winter Olympics. Visa is the exclusive payments technology partner of the games.
• Mastercard is also trying to capture business from affluent consumers. During the quarter, Mastercard launched the Mastercard World Legend card designed for ultra-high net worth individuals.

Our take: As card networks and their issuer partners prepare for 2026, all are acknowledging macroeconomic uncertainty makes planning difficult.

Lower-income consumers are more sensitive to tariff-induced inflation and other economic events. If lower- and medium-tier cardholders pull back on spending, their premium counterparts who are more insulated from economic pain can keep spending afloat. Issuers are following the same strategy: Citi, Chase, and American Express all launched or revamped premium cards this year.