Will Visa's proposed restructure and IPO reduce its global legal exposure?

Implications: Visa's has proposed a global corporate restructure and IPO to help distance itself from antitrust risks.  Its recent filings with the SEC explaining its plan is an exceedingly complex, dreary and foreboding document.  It does not inspire confidence. 

Analysis:  

Visa's SEC filings portray a global company and network in extreme legal distress.  It discloses potentially crushing government enforcement and private action lawsuits (the latter mostly in the US) that could bury it in damages, price controls, new regulations, internecine disputes among its customers and by them against it, potential loss of major customers (to competitors like MasterCard and American Express) , growing privacy challenges, and possible rejection of the restructure by its members and/or government.  The filings also reveal what amounts to a spin off of Visa Europe from the greater organization.  In comparison to MasterCard's filings a year ago, it is quire pessimistic.  MasterCard restructured with a totally independent board; Visa will continue to have a strong presence of its major issuers on its new board.  It could backfire on its efforts to end contention over its interchange pricing of merchants.