Based on the aggregated intelligence of 180,000-plus investors participating in Motley Fool CAPS, the Fool's free investing community, credit card giant MasterCard (NYSE: MA) has earned a respected four-star ranking.

With that in mind, let's take a closer look at MasterCard's business and see what CAPS investors are saying about the stock right now.

MasterCard facts

Headquarters (founded) Purchase, N.Y. (1966)
Market Cap $53.0 billion
Industry Data processing and outsourced services
Trailing-12-Month Revenue $7.0 billion
Management CEO Ajaypal Banga (since 2010)
CFO Martina Hund-Mejean (since 2007)
Return on Equity (Average, Past 3 Years) 43.1%
Cash/Debt $5.2 billion / $0
Dividend Yield 0.3%
Competitors American Express
Discover Financial Services
Visa

Sources: S&P Capital IQ and Motley Fool CAPS.

On CAPS, 92% of the 3,242 members who have rated MasterCard believe the stock will outperform the S&P 500 going forward.

A couple of months ago, one of those Fools, Cascell, succinctly summed up the bull case for our community:

In my opinion MasterCard, and to a lesser extent Visa, are great companies with a fairly hefty stranglehold on the sharp end of e-commerce. ... The financials all seem to stack up -- increasing EPS, high margins, no long term debt, ridiculous amounts of cash on hand. ... When you add in the fact that [MasterCard] is a truly global brand and there are reasonably high barriers to entry [it's] hard to see how this company can trip up.

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