Nadia Stephenson

Expertise

Nadia is a Managing Associate in the Commercial team specialising in payments and fintech arrangements. She spent almost six years in AG's London Commercial team and transferred to the Dubai office in May 2025.

Nadia frequently advises on a range of payments transactions for the firm's largest clients, such as technology companies, retailers, banks, fintechs and other payment service providers. She regularly works cross-jurisdictionally and for clients based overseas.

Nadia advises on payment processing and gateway agreements, and new payments technologies, including open banking, digital wallets and buy-now-pay-later arrangements, as well as advising on material outsourcings, referral and partnership agreements and marketplace and payment facilitation arrangements.

Nadia also has experience of working in-house at two banks, at Amazon UK and internationally in Hong Kong on secondment.

Experience

Advised one of the largest banks in the GCC on its template agreements for merchant acquiring services, payment facilitation services, and referral arrangements, as well as its arrangements with a global digital wallet payments provider.
Advised a global retailer and technology provider on the operation of its e-commerce business, online marketplaces, and stored value propositions in the United Kingdom, Europe, the United Arab Emirates, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and Oman, including advising on structuring such propositions, regulatory exemptions, and negotiating global framework agreements with payment service providers and technology providers.
Advised on a wide range of payment partnership agreements, including merchant referral, payment facilitation, reseller, marketplace, and ISO arrangements.
Advised multiple fintech clients in the United Kingdom and a bank in Saudi Arabia on the drafting of payment facilitation agreements.
Advised an international bank on its co-branded cards and embedded finance arrangements with a UK retailer.
Advised an international technology company on multiple arrangements with payment service providers to provide first-party and third-party payment services on its online retail and marketplace platforms.
Advised a UK fintech on various embedded finance propositions to be resold by its technology clients on a white-labelled basis.
Advised a UK bank on the formation of its banking-as-a-service and payments-as-a-service strategic partnership with a technology company.
Advised a UK bank on the establishment of its merchant acquiring business and the associated software development arrangements and outsourcing agreements with key suppliers.
Advised an international technology company on its global open banking and direct debit arrangements with a multinational payment services provider.

Year qualified