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 (MA 0.07%) has earned a respected four-star ranking.

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

MasterCard facts

Headquarters (founded)

Purchase, N.Y. (1966)

Market Cap

$72.4 billion

Industry

Data processing and outsourced services

Trailing-12-Month Revenue

$7.5 billion

Management

CEO Ajaypal Banga (since 2010)
CFO Martina Hund-Mejean (since 2007)

Return on Equity (average, past 3 years)

40.5%

Cash / Debt

$5.0 billion / $0

Dividend Yield

0.4%

Competitors

American Express
Discover Financial
Visa 

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

On CAPS, 92% of the 3,452 members who have rated MasterCard believe the stock will outperform the S&P 500 going forward.   

Just yesterday, one of those bulls, fellow Fool Simon Erickson (TMFInnovator), succinctly summed up the outperform case for our community:

Incredible business that has lots of things to like:

-Their open-loop network carries lower risk and benefits from network effects. This shields MA (and V) from other competitors entering their market.
-Global macro trend moving from cash and checks to electronic payments.
-Operating margins that have steadily improved over the past five years and are now over 50%.
-No long-term debt.
-Excellent management.
-Quadrupled their dividend in the last two years and it is still less than 10% of free-cash-flow.

I've had this company on my radar for a while, but never pulled the trigger. Until now.