It’s a remarkable achievement given that Mastercard operates in two industries that have had an uneasy few years -- finance and “old” tech. Financial companies like big banks have been slowed by new regulations. And many tech companies that -- like Mastercard -- came of age decades ago have often been disrupted by newer tech companies. IBM and Oracle are still powerful operators, but they’re nowhere near what they once were.

But Mastercard has mostly avoided new regulations since the financial crisis, aside from the impact of an amendment to cap fees on debit card transactions. And the company has raced to embrace new technology, making sure that it remains at the center of each transaction, whether that transaction is being conducted on a credit card, a phone, or entirely in the cloud. Apple Pay, for instance, was routed through Visa and Mastercard’s systems rather than bypassing them. And Mastercard is partnering with PayPal, blunting competition from PayPal. Mastercard has a co-branding partnership, for instance, on global PayPal debit and credit cards.

Venmo, which is owned by PayPal, and Zelle, which works with big banks, do allow people to transfer money directly and they pose some threat to the credit card companies. But Visa and MasterCard have begun partnering with those peer-to-peer systems too to allow people to send money faster.

While cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin could eventually make Mastercard and Visa unnecessary, they remain much too inefficient to be used for daily payments.

On a conference call after Mastercard’s earnings report on Tuesday, Mastercard CEO Ajaypal Banga talked about other new technologies that Mastercard is embracing. It’s embracing the Internet of Things by working with Garmin and Fitbit to let people pay just by tapping their smartwatches and partnering with Saks Fifth Avenue and others to integrate payments into augmented reality programs. “Fun and games on the innovation front,” Banga said. And a remarkably strong model for staving off competition.

Big Picture: Mastercard has smartly kept the “disrupters” at bay as it has upgraded its payment systems and made smart partnerships.