Approach to Environmental, Social and Governance

In line with international ESG guidelines and corporate best practices, Visa’s overall approach to ESG focuses on identifying priority topics at the intersection of relevance to Visa’s long-term business strategy and success and importance to our stakeholders, including employees, clients, investors and ratings agencies, governments, civil society organizations, communities and others.

To inform our ESG strategy, Visa conducts a biennial ESG materiality assessment in accordance with the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) guidelines while also monitoring and reassessing our approach to managing priority topics during interim years. Our biennial materiality assessment process includes the following steps:

1. Benchmarking: We research peers and sustainability leaders to understand the current ESG landscape.
2. Identification: We review a broad set of stakeholder sources to identify ESG issues likely to be most relevant to Visa, including input from customer and client information requests on ESG topics, employee surveys and direct feedback from our shareholders. We also interview internal and external stakeholders to capture their perspectives on the most salient ESG risks and opportunities to our business.
3. Prioritization: We conduct quantitative and qualitative analysis to prioritize ESG topics.
4. Validation: We share assessment results with our leadership to confirm the final prioritization of topics and to help us refine our ESG strategy.

At Visa, ESG activities are managed at a functional level across our strategic and operational areas, with executive and Board oversight.

At the management level, a cross-function body has served as the central coordinating entity facilitating our ESG strategy and reporting efforts. The group has included cross-functional representation from more than a dozen senior leaders.

At the Board level, the Nominating and Corporate Governance Committee of the Board has formal responsibility for and oversight of ESG policies, programs and reporting in their totality as well as for the individual topics of environmental sustainability, climate change, human rights, political activities and expenditures, and social impact and philanthropy. These responsibilities are incorporated into the Committee Charter for the Nominating and Corporate Governance Committee, available on our Board Committees and Composition page.

Additional responsibilities for individual ESG topics include the following:

• Audit and Risk Committee: Risk management (including risk from ESG issues), ethics and compliance, cybersecurity and information security
• Compensation Committee: Executive compensation, diversity and inclusion
• Finance Committee: Tax strategy

Visa is committed to providing transparency on our ESG approach and performance through various channels and platforms of ESG reporting.

Our reporting efforts are guided by the following key principles:

• Materiality: Reporting on our most significant ESG topics
• Comparability: Reporting in a manner that enables stakeholders to analyze changes in our performance over time 
• Balance: Reporting that reflects various aspects of our performance
• Timeliness: Reporting on a regular cadence and in time for stakeholders to make informed decisions

Our core platform for Visa’s ESG reporting is our annual Visa ESG Report, which is aligned with leading reporting frameworks such as those from the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI), the Sustainability Accounting Standards Board (SASB) and World Economic Forum Stakeholder Capitalism Metrics (WEF SCM). Current and prior versions or the Visa ESG Report are available on our ESG Resources page.

We complement the transparency of our ESG Report in the following ways:

• Reporting initiatives: Participation in additional reporting initiatives such as CDP
• ESG ratings firms: Engagement with leading ESG firms on Visa’s corporate profile
• Rankings / Lists: Submissions to ESG-focused rankings and lists
• Stakeholder engagements: Dialogue with stakeholders on our ESG performance

Visa actively participates in ESG-related organizations and peer networks focused on various sustainability topics. Key memberships include:

• Business for Social Responsibility
• Business Roundtable
• Catalyst
• Centre for Sport and Human Rights
• Chief Executives for Corporate Purpose (CECP)
• Corporate Eco Forum
• RE100
• Renewable Energy Buyers Alliance (REBA)
• Sustainable Brands, Brands for Good
• Travalyst
• World Economic Forum

Understanding the views and priorities of Visa stakeholders supports our work across our business and ESG strategic areas. We regularly engage our stakeholders in a variety of ways, including but not limited to the following:

• Employees: Employee surveys, all-staff meetings, manager/employee dialogue, employee resource groups (ERGs)
• Clients: Client councils, payment forums, client surveys, direct engagement
• Investors: shareholder earnings calls, direct engagement, SEC filings, investor conferences, ratings firm profiles
• Government and policy officials: Direct engagement, testimony before government bodies, Visa School of Public Policy, industry association memberships and participation, public policy gatherings, partnerships and collaboration
• Civil society organizations: Direct engagement, conferences and events, memberships in initiatives, individual partnerships