Adyen: a payments platform paid in basis points

Adyen accepts, processes and settles payments for merchants on one platform it built itself: online, in store and inside software platforms, across regions, under its own banking licence. It charges merchants the interchange and scheme fees the card networks set, passed through at cost, plus its own fees, and holds their money for a day or two on the way through.

Adyen N.V. is listed on Euronext Amsterdam, reports under IFRS in euros and files nothing with the SEC: an annual report and two shareholder letters a year, with business updates for the first and third quarters, all as PDFs and none with XBRL. Every figure here was read from those documents by hand and is cited by page and line.

Adyen processed €1,394.3bn in 2025 and kept 16.96 basis points of it as net revenue, €2,364.2m. Its EBITDA margin rose from 45.7% in 2023 to 52.7%. The question is what each euro of volume earns as the mix moves towards platforms and larger merchants, who pay less per euro, and how much of the margin is operating leverage against a team that grew from 4,196 to 4,771.

Processed volume is merchants’ payments: €1,394.3bn. Non-interest revenue is what Adyen billed them under IFRS: €2,646.9m. Net revenue is that less €193.0m of costs from financial institutions and €102.3m of terminals sold, plus €12.6m of net interest income: €2,364.2m. The model never lets one stand in for another.

The interchange and scheme fees merchants pay through Adyen are in none of the three. From 1 January 2023 Adyen changed its merchant terms and acts as agent for them, so they are netted before the first line; 2022 was not restated. That year, the last shown gross, revenue was €8,935.6m and €7,551.0m of it went straight back out, 84.5%. Comparing 2023 net revenue with 2022 revenue would find a collapse that never happened.

The take rate is net revenue over volume. Adyen states it to a tenth of a basis point and the page derives it to a hundredth: 16.76 in 2023, 15.52 in 2024 and 16.96 in 2025. Tiered pricing lowers a merchant’s rate as its volume grows, which Adyen blamed for 2024’s fall; the mix of merchants lifted 2025.

By commercial pillar the rates differ widely. In the first half of 2026, the only period with volume by pillar, Digital earned 16.82 basis points, Unified Commerce 17.34 and Platforms 12.26. Platforms is the fastest-growing pillar, 49.9% in 2025 and 11.2% of net revenue, so the company rate falls as it grows even if no pillar’s rate moves. Volume by region is not published, so no regional take rate can be derived: the regions appear here only as shares of net revenue, EMEA 57.6% of it in 2025.

Most of the cost base is people. In 2025 wages, salaries, social securities and pensions were 32.0% of net revenue, down from 36.5% in 2023, and other operating expenses 15.4%. Net revenue per average employee rose from €467.4k to €518.7k while people costs per employee rose from €164.2k to €165.9k, and the incremental margin was 68.8%.

That leverage is a choice about hiring. The 2026 team includes 399 people from the Talon.One and Orb acquisitions, completed on 1 July, and the first half’s margin was 49.2%. The forecast is headcount times cost per employee, so a reader can see what each extra point of hiring costs the margin.

Of the €10,797.4m of cash at 31 December 2025, €5,810.1m was owed on to merchants and financial institutions, net of what they owed Adyen; own cash was €4,987.3m. All of it earns interest, mostly at central banks: finance income was €267.6m in 2025, 19.2% of income before tax, down from €349.8m as rates fell.

Adyen is a bank under Dutch supervision and holds capital accordingly: own funds of €4,638.4m at the end of 2025, all common equity, and a CET1 ratio of 62.6% at 30 June 2026. It pays no dividend and has no borrowings.

Adyen publishes financial objectives, and they have moved this year. On 12 February 2026 it expected 2026 net revenue growth of 20% to 22% on a constant currency basis, an EBITDA margin broadly in line with 2025, CapEx of up to 5% of net revenue and 550 to 650 net new team members, with an EBITDA margin above 55% by 2028.

On 13 August 2026 it raised the growth range to 21% to 23%, including the acquisitions, and expected CapEx of 7% of net revenue. On 28 October 2026 it kept the growth range, said it expects an EBITDA margin of 50% in 2026 as it accelerates investment, targeted 1,000 to 1,100 net new team members including the acquisitions, and discontinued the 2028 margin objective.

These are Adyen’s statements, quoted with their dates. None is an input to the model: the base case’s 2026 rests on the nine months published plus an assumed fourth quarter, and its later years on this page’s own judgements.

The model keeps three kinds of number on three sheets. Reported holds only what Adyen published, each row with its document, page and line, read by hand because there is no XBRL to check against. Derived holds arithmetic on Reported and nothing else: the take rates, gross and net per unit of volume, EBITDA and free cash flow rebuilt, people costs per employee, own cash. Forecast holds the assumptions in three cases, every row an editorial judgement of this page and none of it Adyen’s guidance.

In the base case 2026 is the nine published months plus a fourth quarter in their trend: €1,760.9bn of volume and €2,851.6m of net revenue, up 20.6%. After it Platforms grows fastest, each pillar’s rate drifts down with tiering, and the company take rate falls from 16.19 to 14.83 basis points by 2030 as net revenue reaches €5,092.4m. The EBITDA margin dips to 50.6% in 2026 and widens to 54.2%.

Valued at 31 December 2025 with share-based pay as a cost, a 9% discount rate and 3% terminal growth, adding own cash and leaving the interest on balances out, that forecast implies €933.87 a share; the downside €654.69 and the upside €1,285.46. It is a consequence of the inputs, not a target, a fair value or a recommendation, and it is never compared with the share price here.