On 5 September 2024, Chamber I of the Federal Civil and Commercial Court dismissed the appeals of Visa International Service Association and Visa Inc. against Resolution 2084/2023, issued on 17 November 2023.
The resolution was issued in the framework of the investigation initiated following a complaint by the Argentine Chamber of Fintech presented at the National Commission for the Defence of Competition (CNDC, for its acronym in Spanish), that denounced the implementation of the Payment Intermediary Foreign Exchange Operators (PIFO) and Expanded Merchand Location Pilot Program (EMLP) by MasterCard and Visa, respectively.
In the process of the investigation, the CNDC identified that Visa enters into contracts with acquirers and merchants in which, presumably, territorial exclusivity clauses are established. In this context, and in order to prevent possible harm to the general economic interest, the CNDC ordered the cessation of any behaviour that could be considered discriminatory or that implied an unjustified refusal of access to the Visa network until the investigation is concluded.
The measure, now confirmed by the Federal Chamber, orders Visa to suspend any contractual clause that prevents a payment facilitator in Argentina from processing foreign merchants' transactions made by consumers in the country, to refrain from implementing any commercial policy that limits the sub-acquiring of cross-border transactions and to terminate out-of-country merchants affiliated by local payment facilitators, as well as to block access to the Visa network for cross-border transactions involving such merchants.
It is worth mentioning that the administrative proceedings corresponding to the case file for alleged anticompetitive conduct are still pending before the CNDC.