[garrettjoecox]

> The settlement, which only applies to US merchants, is the result of a lawsuit filed in 2005. However, nothing is considered finalized until it receives approval from the US District Court for the Eastern District of New York.

> Typically, swipe fees cost merchants 2% of the total transaction a customer makes — but can be as much as 4% for some premium rewards cards, according to the National Retail Federation. The settlement would lower those fees by at least 0.04 percentage point for a minimum of three years.

It took a 20 year antitrust lawsuit to bring a 2% fee down to 1.96% for 3 years? Am I reading that wrong? Or maybe this is more about reducing the additional fees for premium rewards cards?

[panarky]

> It took a 20 year antitrust lawsuit to bring a 2% fee down to 1.96% for 3 years?

It's worse than that.

See: https://www.creditslips.org/creditslips/2024/03/the-proposed...

"When the litigation began in 2005, average interchange fees were 1.75%. After the settlement, they will be at 2.19%"

"Credit card interchange fees after the settlement will be 25% higher than when the litigation began."

"When the litigation began in 2005, American merchants paid the highest interchange fees in the developed world. After the settlement, American merchants will still pay the highest interchange fees in the developed world."

[Two4]

When your transaction flow represents trillions of dollars, fractions of a percentage point is still huge amounts of money