Visa adds $700 million to litigation fund

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Visa Inc (V.N), the world's largest credit card network, said on Tuesday it set aside $700 million to cover legal expenses.

Before becoming a public company in March 2008, Visa set aside $3 billion to cover lawsuits. Last December, it added $1.1 billion to its litigation account.

The credit and debit card network has spent $2.1 billion in a settlement with American Express Co (AXP.N) over anti-competitive practices, and last year it agreed to pay $1.89 billion to Discover Financial Services (DFS.N) over several quarters in a similar settlement.

Visa said the new addition to its litigation account had the effect of a $700 million repurchase of the company's common shares. Under the terms of its initial public offering, Visa's U.S. bank shareholders agreed to have their stakes diluted to fund litigation in order to save other shareholders from direct losses from lawsuits in certain U.S. court cases.

Visa shares were down 0.3 percent to $62.75 in premarket trading on the New York Stock Exchange.

(Reporting by Juan Lagorio, Editing by John Wallace)