Nexi, an Italian payments company, has agreed to buy BPER Banca and Banco Di Sardegna‘s shop payments business for up to $412 million, bringing with it a network of around 110,000 stores.

Nexi, one of Europe’s leading payment firms, has been constantly rising its merchant services business through comparable acquisitions, including a $1 billion agreement with Italy’s top bank, Intesa Sanpaolo, in 2019. Nexi will purchase BPER‘s merchant payment and point-of-sale (POS) businesses, as well as its Banco di Sardegna subsidiary, under the new agreement.

The transaction is worth up to 384 million euros, including a 66 million euro delayed component that will be paid when certain criteria are fulfilled. Nexi and BPER initiated exclusive negotiations on the sale in February, twice putting out a deadline to wrap up talks due to a commercial relationship.

“The deal goes through and it is good news,” Banca Akros analyst Luigi Tramontana said, reiterating a “buy” rating on Nexi after repeated delays. According to BPER, the transferred firm processed 13 billion euros in transactions last year using a network of about 150,000 card terminals.

The sale included a long-term strategic collaboration with Nexi, which will allow the bank to preserve “significant exposure” to the firm for the duration of the agreement, according to Italy’s fifth-largest bank. The agreement is scheduled to close in the second half of the year. By 0917 GMT, Nexi‘s stock had risen 1.3 percent, while BPER‘s had risen 2%, surpassing a 0.2 percent advance in Italy’s blue-chip index.

According to Equita SIM, a Milan-based broker, the firm sold might have been valued at roughly 10 times its predicted core profit in 2022, boosting Nexi‘s profits per share by around 2% without having a substantial impact on the debt leverage ratio.

Nexi was advised by Rothschild. BPER‘s only financial adviser on the purchase was Deutsche Bank, with legal counsel provided by Gianni & Origoni and financial due diligence provided by Deloitte.