Adyen's AI subscription is eating into commodity payment offerings, and its own AI data centers should pay off far better than buybacks over the long term despite a slower payoff. Two-thirds of new customers already take the subscription; only Adyen and Stripe are ready for the future of payments. Morningstar sees a 42% discount to €1,620, a five-star price and a wide moat expected to last at least 20 years. Adyen remains one of the best opportunities for patient long-term investors. x.com  x.com  … Show more

Adyen's Orb acquisition is not bad news because Adyen says it is keeping its single, unified platform. Orb brings a new value proposition and will help Adyen with complex billing while staying fairly autonomous, and the deal adds no debt. Two acquisitions in six months is surprising given Adyen's mentality, as @jarodjmnz noted, but the market has welcomed the latest one. x.com  x.com  x.com 

Adyen's slowing growth and hard-to-estimate return on its billing investment make the stock increasingly difficult to underwrite. Management reduced its 2026 revenue-growth outlook twice; the margin cut reflects plans to hire about 1,000 people for billing, but the return on that upfront investment is difficult to estimate. x.com 

PayPal is still growing, but the quality of its growth keeps worsening, which justifies a compressed multiple. Revenue rose 7% and TPV 11%, yet transaction margin dollars grew only 3%, operating income fell and GAAP EPS dropped 6% as operating margin shrank about 200 basis points. That points to Stripe, Adyen, Apple and Google eroding pricing power. Engagement is flattening, and guidance for falling near-term EPS signals a trend. At 10x earnings it is a fair business, not a great one. x.com  … Show more