Mastercard Completes Acquisition Of Threat Intelligence Firm Recorded Future: Retail Sentiment Score Improves

Payments giant Mastercard Inc (MA) announced on Friday it has completed the acquisition of threat intelligence firm Recorded Future. Shares of Mastercard were trading over 1% higher on Friday afternoon.

Recorded Future is the world’s largest threat intelligence company, with over 1,900 clients across 75 countries, including the governments of 45 countries and over 50% of the Fortune 100. The company provides real-time visibility into potential threats by analyzing a broad set of data sources.

Executive vice president of Security Solutions at Mastercard Johan Gerber said that with the world becoming more digitized, there's an increased focus on securing every interaction and transaction against evolving cyber threats.

“Adding Recorded Future’s AI-driven threat intelligence capabilities to our cybersecurity services, identity solutions and real-time fraud scoring will enable us to better support our customers in these efforts,” Gerber added.

In September this year, Mastercard had announced that it is set to acquire Recorded Future from Insight Partners for $2.65 billion. Insight Partners had reportedly acquired a controlling interest in the firm in 2019.

Notably, cybercrime is projected to cost $9.2 trillion globally in 2024 alone. The acquisition of Recorded Future will add to Mastercard’s identity, fraud prevention, real-time decisioning and cybersecurity services, bringing expanded threat intelligence capabilities to its network of merchants and financial institutions.

Meanwhile, retail sentiment on Stocktwits continued to trend in the ‘bearish’ territory (44/100), albeit with a higher score. The move was accompanied by high message volumes.

Earlier this week, Mastercard’s board of directors declared a quarterly cash dividend of $0.76 per share, and a new share repurchase program.

The cash dividend represents a 15% increase over the previous dividend of $0.66 per share and will be paid on Feb. 7, 2025 to holders of record of its Class A common stock and Class B common stock as of Jan. 9, 2025.

The company’s new share buyback program authorizes it to repurchase up to $12 billion of its Class A common stock.

Meanwhile, shares of Mastercard have gained over 25% since the beginning of the year.

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