Visa raises Earthport offer to $320 million, tops Mastercard bid

(Reuters) - Visa Inc on Friday sweetened its offer for payment company Earthport Plc to about 247 million pounds ($319.84 million), topping rival Mastercard Inc's earlier bid.

A unit of Visa offered 37 pence in cash for each Earthport share, higher than the 30 pence per share it offered in December. Mastercard last month offered 33 pence per Earthport share.

Earthport, which had backed the Mastercard bid earlier, said it had recommended shareholders to accept the increased Visa offer.

(Reporting by Arathy S Nair in Bengaluru; Editing by Arun Koyyur)