The BankAmericard program adopted the name Visa in 1976 for its international card network.
Bank of America launched BankAmericard in 1958, creating one of the first general-purpose credit-card programs in the United States. The program expanded through licensing and international relationships, but different countries used different names and operating arrangements.
In 1976, the international program was unified under the name Visa. The shorter name was intended to work across languages and national markets. Visa Inc. later became a global payments-network company, connecting consumers, merchants, financial institutions, and governments.
Visa is a payments network rather than a traditional bank that directly lends to every cardholder. Banks and other financial institutions issue Visa-branded cards, while Visa provides the network and processing infrastructure used to authorize and settle transactions.