US Bancorp subsidiary Nova Information Systems (Nova) has signed a definitive agreement to acquire SEB Kort's merchant acquiring business in Norway, Euroline Norge.
SEB Kort acquired the Euroline acquiring business in 2003 - which was then called Europay Norge. Euroline claims approximately 50% market share of merchant volume in Norway.
Tine Wollebekk, MD of SEB Kort's activities in Norway, says: "We are selling our acquiring business because the current competitive environment in Europe requires large volumes and economies of scale in order to obtain sufficient profitability in this business."
Wollebekk says that SEB Kort's focus has primarily been on card issuing. In June the bank bought the Eurocard card issuing business in Denmark from PBS International.
Follwing the acquisition, EuroConex Technologies, Nova's Norway-based affiliate, will manage the processing services for all merchant customers.
Nova bought the 50% stake in Euroconex it didn't already own from Bank of Ireland in April. This year, Nova has also acquired Alliance & Leicester Commercial Bank's (ALCB) merchant acquiring business, Union Bank of California's merchant card payments processing business, and the Cardpoint payments processing business from Bank Zachodni WBK (BZWBK)- the Polish subsidiary of Allied Irish Bank.