The banking and payments services company floated the plan to offload pieces of the business after sales declined for that segment.
Lynne Marek/Payments Dive
Fidelity National Information Services plans to try to sell parts of its capital market business following a slowdown in sales by that division.
The Jacksonville, Florida-based company delivered the disappointing report for the capital markets segment when it disclosed second-quarter earnings on Tuesday. In commenting on the capital market division’s results, CEO Stephanie Ferris said it was a situation of misplaced expectations.
“We entered the year leaning in hard to accelerating our sales momentum and the conversion of our existing backlog, as well as an expectation for organic growth to recover in our lending business from the volatility we saw in 2025,” Ferris said of the division, which capital markets division that sells services to the trading industry. “Unfortunately, these expectations did not materialize.”
To respond to the lower-than-expected revenue and profit from that capital markets division, FIS reset its expectations for the rest of the year and has begun to review a possible sale of some parts of the business.
“As part of that same discipline review, we’re also announcing an evaluation of strategic alternatives relating to select products that we’re actively managing within our capital market segment that may not fit the strategic profile of our overall business,” Ferris said during a webcast Tuesday with analysts.
The company, which provides technology and payments services to bank and capital market clients, has been adjusting its business to absorb the acquisition of the card issuing business it agreed tobuy from Global Paymentslast year. The transaction was completed in January.
For the second quarter, FIS reported net earnings of $231 million, compared to a loss of $470 million for the period last year, according tothe company’s earnings releaseTuesday. It was a comparison complicated by the purchase of the issuing business from Global Payments, as well as the simultaneous sale by FIS of its Worldpay merchant services business to Global Payments.
Second-quarter revenue increased 29% over the year-ago period to $3.4 billion.
While income during the quarter for the banking services business climbed 44% to $2.5 billion, revenue for the capital markets unit rose only 3.5% to $810 million, the release said. Within the capital markets division, Chief Financial Officer James Kehoe pointed to the professional services unit as having fallen short.
“Professional services declined by 17% and fell short of expectations due to lower sales and a slower than anticipated conversion of backlog,” he said on the webcast.
Ferris was apologetic about the results not meeting analysts’ expectations, but said it was more of a company miss than a result of some new trend in the market. She also promised that the company would make up for the lost ground.
“Rest assured, we are actively addressing these misses with actions that we’ve already taken, and with new actions that we’re putting in place now,” she said.
While its sales to financial institutions have performed better than the capital markets segment this year, questions have still arisen about possible competition in that area from Visa, which acquired a company called Pismo that also sells such services to banks.
Ferris repeatedly told analysts on the call that there is no reason to worry about competition from Pismo because she views it as competing only for small and mid-size clients and not for the larger banks that are the core of the FIS business.
She pointed to remarks from Visa CEO Ryan McInerney during that company’s earnings report last week to support her view of the competitive field. Visa is expanding its integrated credit issuer processing services said on July 28
“You heard from the CEO of Visa last week that their strategy around Pismo is to target small to mid-sized banks and fintechs, not large banks where we operate,” Ferris said on the call.
Still, at least some analysts who follow FIS expressed caution about investing in the company, given the direction it is headed. “We are uncertain if the stock will work if investors fear slow growth, aggressive competition, and complex financials,” analysts at the investment firm Robert W. Baird told clients in a note Tuesday.
Like other companies in the payments sphere, FIS is counting on the advances of artificial intelligence to create more market opportunities.
“We sit on a rich set of data across banking, payments, and capital markets. As AI adoption grows, that data becomes a meaningful advantage and enables us to deliver smarter solutions, automate workflows, and improve outcomes for clients,” Ferris said.
Still analysts took note of FIS cutting its expectations for this year for all of its business.
“The company reduced its FY26 guidance across the board, with management attributing the change to softer sales and slower conversion within the Capital Markets segment,” RBC Capital Markets analyst Dan Perlin told that investment firm’s clients in a note Tuesday.
Filed Under:Banking,Technology
