You thought chocolate and peanut butter was a winning combination.  Try "Visa - Authorize.net" which should prove to spur incessant growth for both companies.  On April 21st, Visa acquired CyberSource, Authorize.net's parent company, for a mere $26 per common share, or roughly the equivalent of $2 billion dollars.  It should prove to be a wise investment for Visa, and perhaps a source of angst for the competitors of Visa and Auth.net.

With this acquisition, Visa gains access to Google, Inc. and Facebook, Inc.  -- two behomoth websites with everflowing traffic.  Moreover, Visa will now further profit from e-commerce business, taking ownership of Authorize.net's 300,000 (and growing) accounts.  Indeed, merchant account experts are noting that Visa just picked up 25 percent of Internet market share -- keeping it away from third party processing powerhouse, PayPal.

This deal underscore's Visa's realization that e-commerce will continue to expand globally and that a prominent payment gateway provides the perfect infrastructure to facilitate Internet business.  Authorize.net has name brand recognition and a Visa - Authorize.net gateway may appeal to even more merchants as some business owners may feel a sense of reassurance going with a product, owned by a ubiquitous, easily recognizable American global payments technology company.  In essence, Visa's  profit centers will expand: It will continue to accrue cash flow from interchange fees paid by credit card processors and now receive direct and ancillary profit from its new payment gateway division.

Moreover, Visa will piggyback on Cybersource's ever burgeoning expertise on fraud prevention.  Cybersource has extremely advanced software analytics and a well of knowledge on e-merchant data.  Visa will benefit from Cybersource's leading role in Internet fraud prevention and be in a better position to manage e-commerce transactions.

The news of the Visa Authorize.net merger received its share of criticism -- primarily eminating from Authorize.net's competitors.  They cite a conflict of interest as Visa's PCI Security Standards Council must oversee all processing-related companies.  Monopolistic concerns center on the fact that Auth.net may obtain "trade secrets" on how to curb e-commerce fraud as all companies must report how they store data electronically.  Moreover, will the council's scrunity be greater for Auth.net competitors?  Such competitors may be undermined and not so readily receive compliance approval (i.e., acknowledging that they are managing and storing data safely).

How does this partnership affect Authorize.net merchants?  CyberSource’s president and CEO, Mike Walsh,  writes: “In the near-term nothing will change. The way you work with our company and partners will remain the same, as will our commitment to deliver the highest quality service and support."

Mr. Walsh adds that Authorize.net merchants can expect greater security measures to reduce the possibility of fraud, an enhanced platform to sell on a global scale, and an increased array of products and services, stemming from additional partnerships in the future.

Let's just hope that the cost for Authorize.net or credit card processing does not (dramatically) increase under the new Visa Authorize.net regime.