Business case & due‑diligence support

Overview

Whether the opportunity is a new market entry, a card program, a platform investment or an M&A transaction in the payments space, we build and stress-test financial models against realistic volume, pricing and cost-to-serve assumptions, including how regulation and scheme or interchange changes could move the margin.

We benchmark the opportunity against comparable markets and competitors we know first-hand.

And we produce commercial and technical due-diligence reports that give investors and management an independent, evidence-based view of the risks and the upside — drawing on the same market and vendor knowledge that underpins our strategy and RFP work.

What we do

• Financial models

  Building models against realistic volume, pricing and cost-to-serve assumptions.

• Stress-testing

  Testing those models so the downside is understood before capital is committed.

• Benchmarking

  Comparing the opportunity with markets and competitors we know first-hand.

• Commercial & technical due diligence

  Independent, evidence-based reports on the risks and the upside.

From assumptions to decision

We build financial models against realistic volume, pricing and cost-to-serve assumptions, then stress-test them. The model is benchmarked against comparable markets and competitors we know first-hand.

In payments the assumptions that matter most move with regulation and network economics, so we test them explicitly:

• Interchange and scheme fees. What happens to margin if fee levels or structures change.
• Rail mix. The shift of volume between cards, instant payments and account-to-account or pay-by-bank flows.
• Regulatory cost. Licensing, safeguarding, fraud liability and compliance as a line in the model, not a footnote.
• Fraud and dispute losses. Who bears them, and how that changes with authentication and liability rules.

What you receive

• Business case. A financial model with clear assumptions, scenarios and sensitivities that management can challenge.
• Commercial due diligence. Market, competitor and customer view of a payments target or proposition.
• Technical due diligence. An independent read of the platform, vendors, scalability and delivery risk.
• An evidence-based summary. The risks and the upside, written for investors and boards.

Shared knowledge

The same market and vendor knowledge supports Strategy & Market Entry (where and how to compete) and Vendor & Processor RFP (which platform or processor), and is underpinned by the market and vendor comparisons from our Research House.