Deutsche Bank Jumps Back Into Payments With Fiserv Deal
Germany’s largest lender sets up joint venture with U.S. payments giant Fiserv, reentering market it exited nearly a decade ago
wsj.com
Deutsche Bank previously sold its digital payments business in 2012.PHOTO: RALPH ORLOWSKI/REUTERS
By
Patricia Kowsmann
June 21, 2021 4:36 am ET
Deutsche Bank AG wants to get back into the suddenly valuable business of digital payments, nearly a decade after getting out of it.
Germany’s largest lender is setting up a joint venture with U.S. payments giant Fiserv Inc. to offer customers payments-processing services. The joint venture will allow Deutsche Bank’s business clients to accept payments from customers, both in person and digitally, through Fiserv’s platform called Clover, which reads credit cards, debit cards and mobile wallets, and records orders and inventory.
Deutsche Bank is eager to re-enter the payments market after it sold the business in 2012 to the U.S.-based EVO Payments International LLC. At the time, digital payments were associated with risky areas for banks, since some of the business involved processing transactions from high-risk clients such as gambling and pornography websites.
The payments-processing industry, meantime, has exploded as commerce moves online and payment-card use eclipses cash. The pandemic has further accelerated the shift, including in Germany, a country traditionally big on using cash.
Brookfield, Wis.-based Fiserv has grown strongly as part of that boom. Its market capitalization is almost three times that of the German lender.
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