(Updates with conference call information in the sixth and ninth paragraphs.)

By Lingling Wei

Of DOW JONES NEWSWIRES

NEW YORK -(Dow Jones)- MasterCard Inc. (MA) posted an 81.9% jump in third- quarter net income, driven by strong consumer spending that recently also has pumped up the results at banks and other credit-card issuers.

Net income was $193 million, or $1.42 a share, compared with $106.1 million, or 79 cents a share, in the year-earlier period. Revenue rose 13.9% to $902 million, thanks to increased adoption of its plastics, more spending on its branded cards and pricing changes associated with cross-border purchases it implemented in April.

Analysts polled by Thomson First Call had expected it, on average, to earn $ 1.07 a share for the quarter on revenue of $871.2 million. In recent trading, the stock was at $85.66, up $11.56, or 15.6%.

The Purchase, N.Y., company, which doesn't deal with consumers directly, makes money from the fees it charges its bank customers for processing credit- and debit-card transactions and providing other payment-related services. MasterCard said it processed $502 billion of global transactions on its branded credit and debit cards in the quarter, a gain of 15% over the year-earlier period. Its bank customers had issued 818 million MasterCard-branded cards as of Sept. 30, up 12.6% from a year ago.

Last month, rival American Express Co. (AXP), as well as bank issuers of credit cards, also reported continued strong purchases and borrowing by consumers despite the lingering fear a slowdown in the U.S. housing market would discourage individuals from spending on things such as electronics and vacations.

Chris McWilton, MasterCard's chief financial officer, told analysts during a conference call Wednesday that the company "didn't see any evidence" of slowing consumer spending in the U.S. According to the latest report from the federal government, U.S. citizens appear to be spending more, bolstered by falling energy prices, wage increases and stock-market gains.

Chief Executive Robert Selander credited MasterCard's "unified global" structure and its ability to deliver results in different regions. "These strong results underscore our success in displacing paper-based forms of payment in all corners of the globe in the face of a highly competitive payments market," he said in a statement.

Total operating expenses declined 2.6% to $627 million. The year-ago figure of $644 million included $67 million related to litigation settlements and an accounting change concerning its cash-based executive incentive plans. Excluding the special items, operating expenses increased 8.8% from the year-earlier period. In addition, MasterCard said its advertising and marketing costs dropped 4.6% to $209 million due to its sponsorship of the World Cup soccer tournament earlier this year.

McWilton said the company expects this quarter to be "our period of highest advertising and marketing" spending, though the fourth-quarter expenses will come in less than the year-earlier period.

MasterCard shares have more than doubled since the company transformed in May into an institution majority-owned by the public from a closely held company owned by thousands of banks. Visa, MasterCard's bigger competitor, announced last month a plan to sell shares to the public within the next year and a half.

Both companies hope that a change in the ownership structure could help them defuse the number of lawsuits facing them. Those include allegations made by merchants over so-called interchange fees they must pay banks when they accept MasterCard- or Visa-branded cards and anti-competitive claims made by American Express and Morgan Stanley's (MS) Discover Financial Services LLC. MasterCard booked a $23 million reserve in the second quarter for future legal settlements.

Meanwhile, both MasterCard and Visa recently have started posting interchange rates on their Web sites to give retailers better access to their rate-setting policies.

-By Lingling Wei, Dow Jones Newswires; 201-938-2089; lingling.wei@dowjones.com