That MasterCard purchased the naming rights to Beijing Olympic Stadium (how do you say “MasterCard Center” in Chinese?) underscores a sophisticated push the card company is making into China. It also hints to the vast opportunity MC sees there, as well as a thorny political situation between the US and China.

MasterCard forecasts China will overtake the U.S. as the world’s largest credit-card market by number of cards by 2020, according to The Wall Street Journal. The problem is that only the state-owned China UnionPay Co. can issue credit cards in the local currency. Additionally, China has limited the involvement in local payments through structural means. Last September, the US Trade Representative filed a formal compliant and “request for consultations” against China with the World Trade Organization. Here’s the heart of the complaint:

In addition to permitting only [China UnionPay] to supply electronic payment services for payment card transactions in China denominated and paid in RMB, China also requires all payment card processing devices at merchant locations to be compatible with CUP’s system, which gives CUP guaranteed access to all merchants in China who accept payment cards. Electronic payment services suppliers of other Members or their participating institutions, by contrast, must negotiate for access to merchants. In addition, China requires that all payment cards, including “dual currency” cards, issued in China for transactions denominated and paid in RMB bear the CUP logo. These and other requirements and restrictions identified below appear to accord less favorable treatment to electronic payment services suppliers of other Members than to Chinese suppliers of these services.

That MasterCard would then go ahead and buy the naming rights to China’s Beijing Olympic Stadium seems to me like a stick-it-to-you move. But does MasterCard have any choice? China has 1.3 billion people and turbo-charged GDP. As Ling Hai, Greater China president for MasterCard, told the WSJ: “Of course China is very important to us.”

The WTO told me that there are no immediate action items related to the US’s compliant scheduled. The complaint will word its way through the WTO dispute resolution process (there are hundreds of disputes before the WTO). In the meantime, whenever Chinese government officials want to see Yao Ming play basketball, they’ll be reminded that MasterCard wants its share.

BEIJING OLYMPIC STADIUM