Ryan McInerney

Overview

Ryan McInerney
Born	1975 (age 50–51) Michigan, United States
Citizenship	United States
Education	Bachelor of Science in finance
Alma mater	University of Notre Dame
Occupation	Business executive
Employer	Visa Inc.
Known for	Leadership of Visa and strategic focus on digital payments
Title	Chief executive officer of Visa Inc.
Term	2023–present
Predecessor	Al Kelly
Board member of	Visa Inc. (board of directors); University of Notre Dame (board of trustees); U.S.-China Business Council (vice chair of the board)
Spouse	Angela McInerney
Children	3
Awards	Fortune "40 Under 40"; FinTech Magazine #1 fintech leader (2025)

🌐 Ryan McInerney (born 1975) is an American business executive who has served as chief executive officer (CEO) of Visa Inc., one of the world’s largest payment networks, since February 2023. A former president of Visa and earlier head of consumer banking at JPMorgan Chase, he has built a career at the intersection of finance and technology, overseeing large-scale retail banking operations and later helping to steer Visa’s transition toward digital and contactless payments.

💳 Payments strategist. As CEO, McInerney has promoted a strategy of turning Visa from a card-centric company into a broader “network of networks” for moving money, targeting payment flows such as business-to-business, person-to-person and account-to-account transfers beyond traditional credit and debit transactions. Under his leadership, Visa has expanded services like Visa Direct for real-time payouts, invested in open banking and digital currency experiments, and pursued partnerships with technology and financial technology firms while maintaining an emphasis on network security and reliability. In 2025, FinTech Magazine ranked him the number-one fintech leader globally, highlighting his role in positioning Visa within the evolving digital payments ecosystem.

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Early life and education

👶 Midwestern upbringing. McInerney was born in 1975 and grew up in Michigan in the American Midwest, in a close-knit community where he was introduced early to the value of hard work and personal responsibility. He comes from an Irish-American family with ancestral roots in County Clare and County Tipperary in Ireland, a background later noted in profiles that emphasised his sense of heritage and community. As a student he showed particular interest in quantitative subjects and developed an early fascination with financial services and emerging technology.

🎓 Notre Dame formation. For his undergraduate studies, McInerney attended the University of Notre Dame, a private Catholic institution in Indiana known for combining academic training with a values-based ethos. He earned a Bachelor of Science degree in finance in 1997, an education that provided the analytical foundation for his later work in risk management and consumer banking. Beyond coursework, Notre Dame’s focus on service and its extensive alumni network shaped his worldview, and he later remained closely involved with the university through advisory roles and, eventually, as a trustee.

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Banking and early career

📊 Consulting apprenticeship. After graduating from Notre Dame, McInerney began his career at management consultancy McKinsey & Company, advising financial services clients on strategy and operations. In one early engagement, he worked on a marketing campaign in which a client mailed millions of compact discs offering internet access to compete with AOL; poor design left customers unable to locate the activation code, and the campaign failed despite its scale. McInerney later described the experience as an expensive lesson in execution and customer experience, reinforcing his focus on operational detail and end-user design in subsequent roles.

🏦 Rise at JPMorgan Chase. In 2005, McInerney moved from consulting into banking, joining JPMorgan Chase, where he held a series of senior roles in consumer finance. He was involved in launching the bank’s first mobile banking application in the mid-2000s, contributing to the early shift of mainstream retail banking onto smartphones. By his mid-30s he had become CEO of JPMorgan’s consumer banking division, overseeing a business with more than 75,000 employees and around US$14 billion in annual revenue, making him one of the youngest executives to lead a large U.S. consumer bank at that scale. His responsibilities at the bank included roles as Chief Operating Officer of Home Lending and Chief Risk Officer for Chase’s consumer businesses, combining product development, operations and risk oversight. Business media frequently cited him as a “rising star” in financial services, and in 2013 Fortune included him in its “40 Under 40” list of notable business leaders.

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Visa career

💼 Recruitment to Visa. In 2013, Visa Inc. recruited McInerney from JPMorgan Chase to become president of the global payments company, in a move that observers at the time regarded as a significant talent loss for the bank. Then-CEO Charlie Scharf personally led the effort to bring him to Visa, viewing his combination of consumer banking experience and digital payments expertise as well suited to the company’s evolving strategic needs. Reports indicated that some leaders at JPMorgan expressed disappointment at his departure, reflecting his prominence within the bank’s leadership ranks.

🌍 Global responsibilities as president. As president of Visa, McInerney assumed responsibility for the company’s global business lines, including relationships with issuing banks, acquirers, merchants and technology partners in more than 200 countries. During this period he played a prominent role in industry shifts such as the rollout of EMV “chip” cards in the United States and the broader adoption of contactless, tap-to-pay technology worldwide. Visa also partnered with mobile wallet providers and technology firms, including serving as a launch participant in Apple Pay in 2014, initiatives in which McInerney was closely involved as a senior executive overseeing product and client strategy. Internally, he was associated with efforts to improve coordination between product engineering teams and regional businesses so that new technologies, such as tokenisation for digital payments, could be deployed consistently across markets.

🏁 Succession to chief executive. Over the course of the 2010s, McInerney came to be viewed by analysts and journalists as a likely successor to Alfred F. Kelly Jr., who became Visa CEO in 2016. By 2022, Bloomberg and other outlets described him as the “heir apparent,” noting his broad exposure to the company’s operations and his role in expanding Visa’s digital payment capabilities. In November 2022 Visa announced that McInerney would succeed Kelly as CEO, with the transition taking effect in February 2023; Kelly remained as executive chairman, and publicly endorsed McInerney as a prepared successor.

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Strategy and leadership at Visa

🔗 Network-of-networks vision. As CEO, McInerney has articulated a strategy of expanding Visa’s role beyond card-based consumer spending into broader money-movement flows, describing a market opportunity in non-card transactions such as business-to-business payments, remittances and account-to-account transfers worth an estimated US$185 trillion in aggregate flows. He has highlighted services like Visa Direct, which enable near-real-time push payments to bank accounts and debit cards, as central to this strategy, with applications including gig-economy earnings, insurance payouts and cross-border remittances. Under his leadership, Visa has pushed to embed its capabilities into software platforms used by businesses and consumers, aiming to make payment interactions less visible while maintaining brand presence in the background.

🧩 Innovation, digital assets and security. McInerney has overseen investments in technologies such as tokenisation, artificial intelligence and data analytics with the aim of improving fraud detection, risk scoring and marketing effectiveness across Visa’s network. Visa under his tenure has also conducted pilot projects and partnerships in areas including blockchain, central bank digital currencies and stablecoin settlement, while emphasising that experiments with digital assets must meet Visa’s standards for compliance and network reliability. In interviews cited in secondary sources, he has framed Visa’s objective as being the preferred way to pay and be paid in an increasingly digital economy, while maintaining a “very high bar” for security and trust.

📈 Financial performance and strategic balance. Visa has continued to report strong financial results during McInerney’s early years as CEO. In fiscal 2025 (ended 30 September 2025), the company generated approximately US$40 billion in revenue, up about 11 percent year-on-year, and around US$22.5 billion in adjusted net income, against the backdrop of ongoing global shifts from cash to digital payments. Visa’s share price rose by roughly 25 percent in that fiscal year, although over a five-year horizon the stock’s performance lagged the S&P 500 index, contributing to investor debates about how to value mature payments networks relative to faster-growing technology firms. Commentators have characterised McInerney’s role as both steward of a franchise whose revenues more than doubled and whose share price nearly tripled in the six years before his appointment, and as a transformer attempting to extend Visa’s business model into areas such as “buy now, pay later” arrangements, open banking connectivity and payments embedded in non-financial applications.

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Compensation and wealth

💰 Chief executive compensation. As CEO of Visa, McInerney has received compensation packages that place him among the higher-paid executives in the U.S. financial services sector. Payments Dive reported that in fiscal 2025 he received total compensation of approximately US$31.56 million, the highest annual figure for a Visa CEO to that date and an increase of about 21 percent from the previous year. The package consisted of an annual base salary of US$1.5 million, stock awards of about US$18.7 million, stock options worth roughly US$5.7 million and an annual incentive bonus of US$5.25 million, alongside smaller amounts of other compensation. The board of directors cited company performance and the alignment of incentives with long-term shareholder interests as reasons for the award.

📊 Equity exposure and net worth. Visa’s proxy disclosures and independent analyses indicate that a substantial portion of McInerney’s wealth is held in Visa equity. GuruFocus, which tracks insider holdings, estimated in late 2025 that he owned around 274,000 Visa shares, with a market value of roughly US$97 million at prevailing prices, contributing to an estimated net worth in the high eight or low nine-figure range. Visa has also disclosed calculations of “actual compensation paid” under U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission rules that incorporate changes in the value of outstanding equity awards, suggesting that the economic value of McInerney’s 2025 compensation would be higher than the grant-date figures when subsequent share price movements are included.

🏦 Share transactions and alignment. In addition to stock grants and options received as part of compensation, McInerney has periodically sold portions of his Visa holdings through pre-scheduled trading plans. Public filings tracked by insider-trading databases reported that he sold shares worth around US$10 million in 2025 while retaining a significant remaining stake. Commentators have noted that his sizeable ongoing equity ownership ties his financial interests closely to those of other long-term shareholders.

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Board roles and industry involvement

🏛️ University governance and education. McInerney has maintained a long-standing association with his alma mater, the University of Notre Dame. In 2024 the university announced that he had been elected to its Board of Trustees, with his term beginning on 1 July 2024. Before joining the board, he had served on Notre Dame’s Undergraduate Experience Advisory Council, advising on student life and educational initiatives. The appointment reflected the university’s view of his experience in global financial services and corporate leadership as relevant to its governance and strategic planning.

🌐 Business associations and policy forums. In the wider business community, McInerney participates in organisations that bring together corporate leaders on economic and policy issues. He is a member of the Business Roundtable, a grouping of chief executives that advocates for business interests in U.S. public policy debates, and serves as a vice chair of the board of the U.S.–China Business Council, a trade association focused on commercial relations between the two countries. He also sits on Visa’s own board of directors, as is customary for the company’s chief executive, but does not appear on numerous external corporate boards, an approach some governance commentators have interpreted as reflecting the demands of running a large global payments network.

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Personal life

🏡 Family and privacy. Sources describe McInerney as keeping a comparatively low public profile relative to some technology-sector chief executives. He is married to Angela McInerney, and the couple have three children. Biographical notes published by Notre Dame and other outlets identify him as a Michigan native who later based his family life in the United States while working in global financial centres, but provide limited detail on his domestic arrangements, reflecting a preference for privacy in personal matters.

🤝 Leadership style and workplace reputation. Profiles of McInerney portray him as analytical and data-driven, with a collaborative style that emphasises consultation and cross-functional coordination. Accounts from colleagues cited in business media describe him as approachable and willing to credit teams for achievements, while also setting demanding performance expectations for large operating units. These portrayals suggest a leadership approach shaped by his background in consulting and risk management, combining quantitative analysis with attention to operational detail.

📚 Interests and philanthropic themes. Publicly available information indicates that McInerney has supported educational and financial-inclusion initiatives, often through institutional programmes rather than prominent personal foundations. He has been associated with efforts by Visa to expand access to digital payments in underbanked communities and with scholarship and mentoring activities linked to universities and industry groups, including programmes encouraging participation in science, technology, engineering and mathematics among under-represented groups. Commentators have also noted that he has shown interest in understanding payment technologies from the perspective of ordinary users, for example by personally testing new payment applications in everyday settings before providing feedback to Visa product teams.

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Criticism and challenges

⚖️ Regulatory scrutiny and antitrust litigation. During McInerney’s tenure as a senior executive and later CEO, Visa has faced increased regulatory and legal scrutiny, particularly in the United States. In 2024 the U.S. Department of Justice filed an antitrust lawsuit alleging that Visa maintained an unlawful monopoly in the debit-card market through rules and incentives that discouraged competition from other networks. The case, which remained ongoing as of late 2025, was described by analysts as one of the most significant legal challenges for the company in years. Around the same period, press reports indicated that McInerney participated in private meetings with senior U.S. officials, including an event hosted by Vice President Kamala Harris, drawing commentary on the political context of the litigation and the company’s engagement with policymakers.

🛒 Merchant disputes and interchange fees. Visa has also continued to confront long-running disputes with merchants over interchange fees, the charges retailers pay on card transactions. In 2025, reports indicated that Visa and other card networks had reached a tentative multibillion-dollar settlement intended to resolve a large U.S. class-action case that had been underway for roughly two decades. McInerney supported taking steps to close this chapter, which Visa and merchant groups had previously described as a significant overhang in their commercial relationships. Nevertheless, some merchant organisations continued to argue that card fees remained too high and that major networks retained considerable market power, concerns that intersected with the broader antitrust scrutiny of the payments industry.

🚀 Competition and structural change. Strategically, McInerney faces competition not only from other global card networks but also from financial technology companies, large technology platforms and emerging payment infrastructures such as digital wallets and account-to-account transfer systems. Observers have noted that firms including PayPal, Block, Stripe and various newer entrants have developed payment services that sometimes bypass traditional card rails, prompting questions about how incumbent networks like Visa will adapt. Additional uncertainties stem from potential central bank digital currencies, developments in decentralised finance and geopolitical risks associated with operating across jurisdictions with differing regulatory regimes. While there have been no major shareholder revolts over his leadership to date, analysts have characterised his task as “threading the needle” between delivering near-term earnings growth and repositioning Visa amid structural shifts in how money moves internationally.

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Awards and recognition

🏅 Industry and media recognition. McInerney has been the subject of numerous profiles in business and technology publications, which have highlighted both the speed of his career progression and his role in shaping Visa’s digital payments strategy. Rankings and awards have frequently placed him among leading figures in financial technology, reflecting the prominence of Visa and the broader attention given to payment infrastructure in the global economy.

• In 2013, Fortune magazine included McInerney in its “40 Under 40” list of business leaders to watch, noting his senior responsibilities at JPMorgan Chase.
• In 2014, Time magazine named him among the “Top 10 Highest-Paid Executives Under 40,” citing compensation data from his banking career.
• In 2023, The Financial Technology Report listed him among the “Top 50 Financial Technology CEOs,” highlighting his leadership at Visa.
• In 2025, FinTech Magazine ranked McInerney first in its list of global fintech leaders, pointing to Visa’s expansion into real-time payments, open banking and digital-asset pilots under his stewardship.

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Legacy and assessment

📌 Career arc and influence. Commentators have described McInerney’s career as an example of how executive trajectories in financial services increasingly encompass both traditional banking and technology-driven payment networks. From his early work in consulting and consumer banking to his leadership of Visa, he has operated within large, complex organisations undergoing structural change as digital channels have reshaped customer behaviour and transaction flows. His progression from Michigan upbringing and Notre Dame finance graduate to head of a global payments company has been cited in media profiles as illustrative of broader shifts in the skills and experiences valued in senior financial-sector leadership.

🔮 Ongoing role in digital payments. Assessments of McInerney’s legacy remain provisional, given the relatively recent start of his tenure as CEO and the rapid evolution of the payments landscape. Analysts have noted that his stated focus on combining continuity—maintaining Visa’s scale, reliability and risk controls—with reinvention through new payment flows, technology partnerships and digital-asset experimentation will likely shape how the company navigates competition and regulation in the coming decade. His emphasis on adapting Visa’s network while “staying true” to its core strengths has been cited as a guiding principle in internal and external communications, underscoring the balance he seeks between preserving an established franchise and reshaping it for a more fully digital financial system.

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