Shift4 Payments (NYSE: FOUR) is working to get ahead in the race in the payments industry through deals and partnerships as it expands into more industries.
The payment services company, which went public in 2020, processes payments for the food and beverage, retail, and travel industries, among several others.
Expansion through acquisitions, partnerships
The company has grown its customer base through acquisitions and setting up partnerships to increase the number of Fortune 500 companies it services.
In 2025, Shift4 Payments acquired Global Blue Group Holding, a Swiss payments company that provides tax-free shopping and currently has a 70% share of that business, Henry Ellenbogen, CIO and managing partner of Durable Capital Partners in Chevy Chase, Maryland, told Barron’s.
Since the deal closed, Global Blue has contributed 25% of Shift4’s revenue, helping it expand into Europe.
When Shift4 Payments first launched, the company primarily focused on providing payments for restaurants. The restaurant business continues to grow organically and currently accounts for about 50% of the business.
However, the payments provider is not content to focus solely on a few industries, as diversified companies can better navigate downturns in the economy or shifts in consumer spending trends. The company has expanded to provide payment services to 10 industries, including airlines and travel, casinos and gaming, sports and entertainment, and transit.
Shift4 Payment has large clients such as pizza chain California Pizza Kitchen, Four Seasons, Choice Hotels, Best Western Hotels & Resorts, Crypto.com Arena, UPS, Allegiant Air, Hilton Worldwide Holdings, Caesar’s Entertainment, and Wynn Resorts, and works with entertainment venues as well as professional and major college sports teams.
“The business mix has improved so much recently that free cash flow conversion [to EBITDA] is now 50%,” he added. “We believe Shift4 can deliver a 25% stock return by December 2026, with no multiple expansion.”
In December, the company entered into a multi-year partnership with Liberty Sports Group and its food and beverage division, Front Row Hospitality, to broaden its customer base. The company services over 150 venues, providing food and beverage programs, venue management, and live event production for concerts, sports, and other entertainment events.
The stock only rose by 5.55% year-to-date, but as the company’s expansion widens, investors are likely to have more confidence in this fintech.
The company’s strategy is to find companies whose payment processing has numerous vendors or locations, such as the New York Yankees, a baseball team whose stadium has dozens of restaurants and shops, which signed on in 2024.
“We want merchants that have 70, 100, or 1,000 revenue centers all managed by different software,” CEO Taylor Lauber said at the ICR Conference in Orlando, Florida. “When you can connect all those things together, the air is very thin from a competitive standpoint.”
The payments industry is increasing globally
With a $5.9 billion market capitalization, Shift4 Payments faces many larger rivals with more customers, but the company is growing quickly and reported a volume of $54.7 billion during the third quarter, up 26% from the previous year, on net income of $33.4 million.
The payments industry remains very competitive with other providers such as Toast (NYSE: TOST) which has a $19.9 billion market capitalization and serves only restaurants, while larger rivals such as Block (NYSE: XYZ) have a $39.5 billion market cap and provide payment services for retailers and allow consumers to send money to each other, and PayPal (NASDAQ: PYPL) has a market cap of $53 billion and works with both public and smaller retailers.
Private companies such as Stripe are also rivals. Founded in 2011, Stripe emerged as an option for online retailers and companies such as Instacart (NASDAQ: CART), Zillow (NASDAQ: ZG), Amazon (NASDAQ: AMZN), and Lyft (NASDAQ: LYFT), but did not begin offering solutions to brick-and-mortar stores until 2018. The global company, valued at $106 billion, has not disclosed any current plans to go public.
The payments industry is growing rapidly globally, especially in Latin America, with an 11 percent rise, while Europe, the Middle East, and Africa (EMEA) increased by 8 percent, and North America increased by 5 percent, according to the 2025 McKinsey Global Payments Report.
Revenue from global payments rose on average by 7 percent annually from 2019 to 2024, as
interest income consisted of 46% of total revenue in 2024, supported by higher rates. In 2024, payment revenue growth fell to 4 percent, compared to a 12 percent increase in 2023.
“This deceleration was caused by peaking interest rates, a more muted macroeconomic environment, structural changes toward lower-yield payment methods, and ongoing fee pressures,” the McKinsey report added. “Nonetheless, payments are still the most valuable subsector in finance. In 2024, payments gave an average 18.9 percent return on equity, with some players earning more than 100 percent.”
Shift4 Payments can continue to attract more clients as more restaurants, hotels, and sports venues adopt one payment provider to streamline their operations and increase their efficiency.
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