Sberbank increased the percentage of merchant transactions it handled by 41 per cent in 2016, moving ahead of Worldpay to become Europe’s largest acquirer with 7.5 billion transactions, according to the latest Nilson Report.

Europe’s 40 largest acquirers of Visa, Mastercard and Maestro bank card transactions handled 57.24 billion transactions, valued at $2.524 trillion from 9.4 million active merchant outlets in 2016. Acquirers in the top 40 handled 7.27 billion web-based and mobile transactions valued at $473.77 billion.

Worldpay handled 7.23 billion transactions, while Barclays finished third with 5.06 billion transactions. Denmark’s Nets was next with 3.62 billion transactions, followed by French firms Cr.Mutuel and Cr.Agricole, which handled 3.24 billion and 2.72 billion respectively.

In total, Europe’s 40 largest acquirers of Visa, Mastercard and Maestro bank card transactions handled 57.24 billion transactions, valued at $2.524 trillion from 9.4 million active merchant outlets in 2016. Acquirers in the top 40 handled 7.27 billion web-based and mobile transactions valued at $473.77 billion.

David Robertson, publisher of the Nilson Report, commented: “Sberbank’s increase is due to investments in contactless acceptance at its merchants as well as expanded card acceptance at transportation systems across Russia, including the Moscow Metro as well as five other metros across the country.”

Svetlana Kirsanova, senior managing director of Sberbank’s retail business block, added: “We have created a centralised technical support service for acquiring clients, introduced uniform service standards that apply in all regions, created an online client account for resolving accounting and IT issues, automated most processes, and ensured that new clients are connected to our acquiring solutions as quickly as possible.”

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