Visa’s Olympic Sponsorship by the Numbers

Since 1986 Visa has been an official sponsor of the Olympic Games, and Visa is the only credit card processing method available for Olympic athletes, coaches and attendees.

At the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver there is not surprisingly a very high demand for credit card processing and to meet that demand Visa has over 250 merchant locations, with over 800 POS terminals in place, including in the Olympic and Paralympic Villages, the Main Press Centre, the International Broadcast Centre and the Olympic Superstore. Throughout Whistler and Vancouver there are also more than 3000 ATMs available for the use of Visa cardholders who need to withdraw cash advances, and of course between the two locales there are thousands of restaurants, retail stores and service providers who accept Visa from all of the hundreds of thousands of Olympic fans.

In partnership with Scotiabank, RBC, Citizens Bank of Canada and Vancity, Visa has also released a number of prepaid cards for the Olympics, featuring images of athletes in such diverse Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games sports ice hockey, snowboarding and alpine skiing.

In the first quarter of 2010, Visa’s recently released earnings were shown to represent a year-over-year increase of 13 percent which was driven in large part by revenues earned off of payment processing.