Morris to Step Down as President of Visa

Visa Inc. said Monday that John C. "Hans" Morris will step down as president and take a different role before leaving at the end of the year.

Visa, which reports its fiscal third-quarter results today, did not name a successor to Morris, 50. Global sales, client service, marketing, product development and "innovation functions" will be consolidated immediately under John Partridge, the chief operating officer.

Visa said the reorganization is an attempt to "heighten organizational effectiveness."

Morris joined Visa in 2007 and played a key role in the San Francisco payments company's $19 billion initial public offering in March 2008.

He was chief financial officer of markets and banking at Citigroup Inc. from November 2002 to July 2007, and had been vice chairman and chief operating officer for the investment banking division at Salomon Smith Barney.

Bob Napoli, an analyst with Piper Jaffray, said that he could only speculate about the reasons for Morris' departure and that the executive did not have a high profile with investors and analysts.

"He was new to the company going into the IPO," Napoli said. "I don't think you can really read anything into who the No. 2 person is, except it's not Hans."

For reprint and licensing requests for this article, click here.
MORE FROM AMERICAN BANKER