Visa 2010 Annual Report Download - page 20

Table of Contents
Employees
At September 30, 2010, we employed approximately 6,800 persons worldwide, including CyberSource. We consider our relationships with our
employees to be good.
Additional Information and SEC Reports
Our corporate Internet address is http://www.corporate.visa.com. On our investor relations page, accessible through our corporate website and at http://
investor.visa.com, we make available, free of charge our annual reports on Forms 10-K, our quarterly reports on Forms 10-Q, our current reports on Forms 8-
K and amendments to those reports as soon as reasonably practicable after they are electronically filed with, or furnished to, the SEC. The information
contained on our website, including the information contained on our investor relations website, is not incorporated by reference into this report or any other
report filed with, or furnished to, the SEC.
ITEM 1A. Risk Factors
Regulatory Risks
Regulations that prohibit us from requiring our customers to use only our network may decrease the number of transactions we process, materially
and adversely affecting our financial condition, revenues, results of operations, prospects for future growth and overall business.
We have agreements with some issuers under which they agree to issue certain payment cards that use only the Visa network or receive incentives if
they do so. In addition, certain issuers of some debit products choose to include only the Visa network. We refer to these various practices as network
exclusivity. In addition, certain network or issuer rules or practices may be interpreted as limiting the routing options of merchants when multiple debit
networks co-reside on Visa debit cards. Increased regulatory scrutiny in the United States has already resulted in laws that will limit our and issuers' ability to
impose rules for, or choose various forms of, network exclusivity and preferred routing in the debit area. See—The U.S. Wall Street Reform and Consumer
Protection Act may have a material adverse impact on our revenues, our prospects for future growth and our overall business. These restrictions and future
regulations like them in the United States and elsewhere have the potential to cause a material decrease in the number of transactions we process. In order to
retain that transaction volume, we might have to reduce the fees we charge to issuers or acquirers, or we might have to increase the payments and other
incentives we provide to issuers or acquirers or directly to merchants. Any of these eventualities could have a material, adverse affect on our financial
condition, revenues, results of operations, prospects for future growth and overall business.
Interchange reimbursement fees and related practices have been receiving significant legal and regulatory scrutiny worldwide, and the resulting
regulations may have a material adverse impact on our financial condition, revenues, results of operations, prospects for future growth and overall
business.
Interchange represents a transfer of value between the financial institutions participating in a payments network such as ours. In connection with
transactions initiated with cards in our payments system, interchange reimbursement fees are typically paid to issuers, the financial institutions that issue Visa
cards to cardholders. They are typically paid by acquirers, the financial institutions that offer Visa network connectivity and payments acceptance services to
merchants. We refer to a system like ours, in which a payment network intermediates between the issuer and the acquirer, as an open-loop system.
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