Visa has reportedly offered Apple roughly $100 million to take over the tech giant's credit card partnership from Mastercard.
Visa has made a bold push to secure the Apple Card, offering an upfront payment typically reserved for the largest card programmes, according to the Wall Street Journal.
American Express is also trying to unseat Mastercard to win the Apple card. Amex is looking to become the card's issuer as well as the network, the report said, citing the sources.
Apple is believed to have held talks with JPMorgan, Barclays and Synchrony Financial to take over the running of its credit card programme from Goldman Sachs, which is seeking to ditch its consumer portfolio.
Such inducements as those on the table from Visa are becoming increasingly common as fintechs jostle for a space in important transactional ecosystems. Klarna, for instance, is believed to have offered Walmart 15.3 million warrants that can be converted into Klarna stock, valued at $500 million to land its recent deal as a BNPL provider to the shopping giant's fintech arm OnePay.