Euronet (EEFT) Enhances Ren Payments Platform With Acquisition
Euronet Worldwide, Inc. EEFT recently announced its acquisition of Infinitium Holdings Pte Ltd in a bid to enhance its Ren payments platform. Infinitium’s products will provide additional protection from customer fraud and merchant chargebacks for online transactions. This move bodes well for EEFT, as an enhanced level of protection will secure payments through its network. The details of the transaction were not disclosed.
Infinitium provides payment authentication and risk management services, such as 3D Secure, helping detect fraud in e-commerce transactions. Such an authentication enhances security and reduces the possibility of unauthorized transactions. Infinitium also offers merchants and acquirers omnichannel payment gateway services.
This move is a time opportune one as regulators in India, the European Union, Singapore, and other countries have already made 3DS mandatory for extra protection against merchant chargebacks and frauds. Although Latin America and the United States have not made this compulsory yet, an enhancement of security is a good strategy, given rising fraud rates.
Earlier this month, EEFT expanded its independent ATM network to Belgium and Mexico. This expansion increases EEFT’s ATM foothold to 38 countries in the Asia-Pacific, Africa, Europe and the Americas. Belgium comes in as the 32nd European country in EEFT’s network, whereas Mexico marks its entry into the emerging LATAM market. Moves like this will enhance EEFT’s revenues from the EFT segment. The EFT ATMs segment accounted for 34% of EEFT’s profit in 2023.
Expanding its existing foothold and entering new regions highlights that EEFT is delivering well on its global expansion strategy. EEFT’s operational services and excellent technology place it in a leadership position in payment innovation.
Zacks Rank and Price Performance
Euronet currently carries a Zacks #2 (Buy).
Shares of EEFT have rallied 30.7% in the past six months compared with the industry’s growth of 15.6%.
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Stocks to Consider
Some better-ranked stocks in the Financial – Miscellaneous Services space are Alerus Financial Corporation ALRS, Axos Financial, Inc. AX and Primis Financial Corp. FRST. Each stock currently sports a Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy). You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank stocks here.
The consensus mark for Alerus Financial’s 2024 earnings is pegged at $1.53 per share, which remained stable over the past week. ALRS beat earnings estimates in three of the past four quarters and missed once, with an average surprise of 14.4%.
The Zacks Consensus Estimate for Axos Financial’s fiscal 2024 earnings is pegged at $7.22 per share, indicating a 42.4% year-over-year increase. It has witnessed four upward estimate revisions against none in the opposite direction during the past month. The consensus mark for AX’s revenues in fiscal 2024 is pegged at $1.1 billion.
The Zacks Consensus Estimate for Primis Financial’s 2024 earnings is pegged at $1.57 per share, indicating a 68.8% year-over-year increase. The consensus mark for FRST’s revenues in 2024 is pegged at $154.9 million.
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