Isracard

Isracard Ltd. is an Israeli payments and consumer-credit institution that issues, operates and acquires payment cards and provides related financing services. The company is listed on the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange under the symbol ISCD and is supervised by the Bank of Israel as part of Israel’s regulated payments and merchant-acquiring sector.^[1][2]

Overview

Isracard is one of Israel’s central credit-card and merchant-acquiring companies. Its business connects cardholders, merchants, banks and international card schemes through the issuance of cards, transaction processing, merchant settlement, and consumer and business credit. The Tel Aviv Stock Exchange describes the company’s activity as issuing and settling credit cards and providing finance services, and classifies its listed ordinary shares in the finance sector, financial-services subsector.^[1]

The company operates in a market where cards are used not only as payment instruments but also as a channel for consumer credit, installment transactions, merchant services and loyalty programs. Isracard’s activities therefore overlap with several parts of the Israeli financial system: bank-distributed cards, non-bank cards, merchant acquiring, personal loans, small-business finance and payment infrastructure.

For regulatory purposes, Isracard appears on the Bank of Israel’s list of supervised merchant acquirers, with reporting symbol 12002.^[2] In 2025, the Bank of Israel also described Isracard as a payment service provider of stability importance when approving a control permit for Isaac Sharon (Tshuva), through Delek Group, following an investment agreement approved by Isracard shareholders on 20 February 2025.^[3]

Business activities

Isracard’s core operations are payment-card issuance and acquiring. In issuance, the company provides cards to customers directly and through distribution agreements with banks or other partners. In acquiring, it contracts with merchants, processes card transactions, and settles funds between merchants, card schemes and issuing institutions. A company profile published by the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange states that Isracard “issues & settles credit cards and finance services,” a concise description of the firm’s position as both a card company and a finance provider.^[1]

The group’s card activity includes several brands. Public filings and company-related disclosures describe Isracard as issuing and acquiring cards under the Isracard, Mastercard, Visa and American Express brands.^[4] The Isracard name is also a domestic card brand, historically important in the Israeli market, while Mastercard, Visa and American Express connect Israeli customers and merchants to international card networks.

The company’s revenues are tied to several payment and finance sources, including card transaction income, acquiring fees, interest income from credit, and related service revenues. Its annual-report data for 2024, as republished by financial filing services, showed income from credit-card transactions of NIS 2.280 billion and net interest income of NIS 947 million; the same summary reported NIS 264 million of net profit attributable to shareholders for 2024.^[5] These figures indicate that Isracard is not solely a payment processor: lending and interest income are material components of its business model.

Isracard also provides credit products to private individuals and businesses. Such financing may include consumer loans, card-based revolving or installment credit, merchant finance and other credit solutions. This places the company in competition with Israeli banks, other credit-card companies, non-bank lenders and fintech platforms. Because the company is a regulated payment and credit institution rather than a deposit-taking commercial bank, its funding, capital and risk structure differ from those of banks such as Bank Hapoalim, Bank Leumi and Israel Discount Bank.

History and separation from Bank Hapoalim

Isracard was historically associated with Bank Hapoalim, one of Israel’s largest banks. A Bank of Israel review of the credit-card sector noted that the Isracard concern was fully owned by Bank Hapoalim and provided a managerial and operational umbrella for credit-card companies controlled by the bank, including Isracard, Europay (Eurocard) Israel and Poalim Express.^[6]

The company’s ownership structure changed as part of Israel’s banking-competition reforms, commonly associated with the “Strum” reform. The reform aimed to reduce concentration in the banking system and promote competition, including by separating major credit-card companies from the large banks that owned them. The Bank of Israel stated in 2016 that Bank Hapoalim and Bank Leumi were instructed to change the governance arrangements of Isracard and Leumi Card in anticipation of separation, with the objective of enabling the separated credit-card companies to become significant competitive factors.^[7]

On 14 April 2019, Isracard became a public company when its shares began trading on the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange. The Bank of Israel described the listing as part of the process of separating Isracard from Bank Hapoalim and stated that 65 percent of the company’s shares were transferred to the broad Israeli public through the offering.^[8] The same Bank of Israel announcement contrasted the Isracard listing with the sale of Leumi Card, later known as Max, noting that the two major credit-card companies were separated through different routes: one by public offering and one by sale to a controlling shareholder.^[8]

The Bank of Israel’s 2020 banking-system report later stated that Bank Hapoalim completed its separation from Isracard in March 2020, marking the completion of the Strum amendments and the separation of Israel’s two largest credit-card companies from Bank Leumi and Bank Hapoalim.^[9] This separation is an important milestone in the structure of the Israeli payments market, because it turned Isracard from a bank-owned subsidiary into an independent listed financial company.

Public listing and securities

Isracard’s ordinary shares trade on the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange under the symbol ISCD. TASE’s market-data page identifies the security as an ordinary share and lists Isracard’s exchange sector as finance—financial services.^[1] As a listed company, Isracard publishes financial statements, risk reports and other investor-relations materials. Its own financial-reporting page includes annual and quarterly financial statements, risk reports, XBRL files and capital-instrument disclosures, including the annual 2024 and 2023 reports.^[10]

The company’s public listing gives Israeli institutional and retail investors exposure to the domestic payments and non-bank credit market. It also subjects the company to Israeli securities-disclosure requirements and market scrutiny. Although the company is a financial institution supervised by the Bank of Israel for payment and merchant-acquiring activity, its listed-company disclosures are also relevant to investors and market participants under Israel’s capital-market framework.

Isracard has also issued debt instruments. TASE lists securities associated with Isracard beyond the ordinary share, including bond-series pages, indicating that the company uses the local capital market as one channel of funding.^[11] Debt funding is important for credit-card companies because receivables and customer-credit portfolios require stable financing sources.

Regulation and supervision

Isracard is supervised by the Bank of Israel, primarily through the banking-supervision and payments-regulation framework applicable to merchant acquirers and significant payment-service providers. The Bank of Israel’s list of supervised banking corporations and merchant acquirers includes Isracard Ltd. under the merchant-acquirer category.^[2]

The regulatory status of credit-card companies has been shaped by two major policy objectives: maintaining payment-system stability and increasing competition in retail financial services. The 2016 Bank of Israel announcement on the separation of credit-card companies from banks emphasized that the regulator sought to reduce potential conflicts of interest during the transition period and preserve the competitive capabilities of the separated companies.^[7]

In July 2025, the Bank of Israel announced that the Governor and Supervisor of Banks had granted Isaac Sharon (Tshuva) a control permit for Isracard, through Delek Group. The announcement stated that the Banking Supervision Department had completed its review process and that Isracard would continue to be supervised by the Banking Supervision Department to ensure stability and fair treatment of customers, similar to supervision of banks and systemically important payment-service providers in Israel.^[3]

The company is also part of Israel’s payment-system access framework. The Bank of Israel has allocated identification codes to payment-service providers and credit-card companies, including Isracard, Cal and Max, for activity in controlled payment systems in Israel.^[12] Such identification is relevant to the technical and regulatory integration of non-bank payment firms into national payment infrastructure.

Role in the Israeli payments market

Isracard’s importance derives from its role across both sides of the card market. On the cardholder side, it issues bank and non-bank cards and provides credit facilities. On the merchant side, it acquires transactions, settles payments and offers merchant finance or related business services. This two-sided position makes Isracard a significant intermediary in Israel’s retail-payments chain.

The post-Strum structure of the market was intended to make companies such as Isracard and Max more independent competitors to the banks. Before the reform, the largest credit-card companies were owned by large banking groups, so the banks controlled both many customer relationships and the card companies’ distribution and data channels. After separation, Isracard could develop independent relationships with consumers, merchants and bank partners while remaining subject to prudential and conduct supervision.

Competition in the Israeli card market includes Cal – Israel Credit Cards, Max It Finance, Premium Express, Diners Club Israel, CardCom and Tranzila, all of which appear on the Bank of Israel’s supervised merchant-acquirer list alongside Isracard.^[2] The presence of several acquirers and payment-service providers reflects a regulatory policy of broadening access to payments infrastructure while keeping supervised entities within a stability framework.

Financial profile

Isracard’s financial profile reflects three main drivers: payment-card transaction volume, merchant-acquiring activity and credit portfolios. For 2024, summarized annual-report data showed NIS 2.280 billion of income from credit-card transactions, NIS 947 million of net interest income, NIS 267 million of credit-loss expenses, and NIS 264 million of reported net profit attributable to shareholders.^[5]

The same annual-report summary showed a portfolio of valid credit cards at 31 December 2024 totaling approximately 5.81 million cards, including about 4.61 million active cards.^[5] These figures illustrate the scale of the group’s consumer reach in Israel. Card-count figures should be interpreted carefully, however, because one customer may hold more than one card and because bank-distributed and non-bank cards may carry different economics and credit-risk allocations.

For 2023, Dun’s 100 ranked Isracard first among Israeli credit-card companies by revenue, listing NIS 2.628 billion in revenue, NIS 155 million in net profit, NIS 2.794 billion in equity and 2,025 employees.^[13] Dun’s 100 later listed Isracard first again for 2024, with NIS 3.150 billion in revenue, NIS 252 million in net profit, NIS 2.997 billion in equity and 1,945 employees.^[14] These rankings are third-party summaries and may not use exactly the same presentation as the company’s statutory financial statements, but they indicate Isracard’s relative size in the Israeli credit-card sector.

Relationship to banks and other payment companies

Although Isracard separated from Bank Hapoalim, it remains linked to banks through distribution, operating and customer-service arrangements. Israeli credit cards have historically been distributed through bank accounts, and bank-issued cards remain an important channel for card companies. At the same time, non-bank cards and direct customer relationships have become more important as competition policy has encouraged credit-card companies to operate independently.

Isracard’s main sector peers include Cal – Israel Credit Cards and Max It Finance. The broader payments ecosystem also includes Shva, which provides card-payment switching infrastructure in Israel, and MASAV, the interbank clearing center. International schemes such as Visa Inc., Mastercard and American Express provide global card-network connectivity, while Israeli acquirers and issuers manage domestic relationships with merchants and cardholders.

Significance

Isracard is significant because it sits at the intersection of Israeli banking competition, consumer credit and payments infrastructure. Its separation from Bank Hapoalim was one of the central practical outcomes of the Strum reforms, and its 2019 public listing created an independent, widely held financial company in a market historically dominated by banks.^[8][9]

The company’s ongoing supervision by the Bank of Israel reflects the public importance of card acquiring and payment services. Merchant acquiring is not merely a private commercial service: interruptions in acquiring, settlement or card authorization can affect retail commerce and business cash flow. For that reason, the Bank of Israel’s treatment of Isracard as a supervised merchant acquirer and, later, a systemically important payment-service provider is central to understanding the company’s place in Israel’s financial system.^[2][3]

Isracard’s future role depends on developments in Israeli payments, bank partnerships, open banking, fintech competition, merchant-acquiring margins, regulation of consumer credit and the strategic direction of its controlling shareholders. Its historical trajectory—from a Bank Hapoalim-controlled card company to a listed and separately supervised payments group—makes it a key example of how Israel has attempted to use structural reform to increase competition in retail finance.