WEX Sees 25% Year-Over-Year Growth in Accounts Payable Automation

When economic uncertainty reigns, handling surprises takes an agile business strategy.

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That was the case with the B2B payments player WEX, which on Thursday (July 24) delivered a second quarter 2025 earnings that revealed a deliberate and disciplined plan to reinvent its growth model one segment at a time.

Most casual observers know WEX as a legacy fuel card provider. That’s not wrong — but it’s no longer the full story.

The company now operates across three distinct segments: Mobility (fleet and fuel payments), Benefits (health-related accounts like HSAs and FSAs), and Corporate Payments (virtual cards, embedded finance, and AP automation).

Each of these business lines represents a different thread in WEX’s transformation from a payments utility into a multiplatform financial infrastructure company.

“Our industry-leading products, service and reliability drive our ability to win customers of all sizes across each of our segments,” WEX’s CEO Melissa Smith told investors on the earnings call. “We’re in a great position to continue to win in the market.”

Across all three segments, the company has been plowing resources into product development, customer experience, and go-to-market capabilities. While some of those bets are still ramping, others are already bearing fruit, as WEX continues building a defensible, multisided platform for B2B financial infrastructure.

Read more: Why Software Platforms Still Struggle to Turn Payments Into Profits 

Fuel Cards to Fintech Infrastructure

The mobility segment, which still accounts for about 50% of WEX’s total revenue, is navigating pressures. Same-store sales across local and over-the-road (OTR) fleets are down, reflecting both efficiency gains (i.e., fewer gallons per mile) and cautious spending by mid-market fleet operators.

Yet the story here isn’t decline — it’s reinvention. WEX recently inked a major new contract with BP, one of the last holdouts among top U.S. fuel retailers. The deal not only brings BP into the WEX network but also allows WEX to issue BP-branded fleet cards linked to its loyalty program.

“This exemplifies WEX’s purpose of simplifying the business of doing business,” Smith said, calling the BP agreement a “cementing” of WEX’s leadership in fleet payments.

While the full revenue from BP’s existing card portfolio won’t hit until after its conversion — likely sometime in 2026 — WEX expects 0.5% to 1% of additional annual revenue from the deal once fully implemented. In the meantime, the company is seeing strong traction from increased investments in digital marketing aimed at small fleet operators. Historically, each dollar spent in this channel has generated $4 in revenue over two years, and early signs suggest the return profile remains intact.

WEX’s Benefits segment may not make headlines, but it continues to be one of the company’s most stable growth engines. Revenue in Q2 rose 8.5% year over year to $195.1 million, driven by 6% growth in software-as-a-service (SaaS) accounts and 11.4% growth in custodial investment income.

This segment — built on the complex infrastructure that powers HSAs, FSAs, and COBRA accounts — has both high margins and high stickiness. Smith emphasized that switching providers in this space is “complex, time-consuming and disruptive,” which explains why WEX serves nearly 60% of the Fortune 1000 and powers more than 20% of the HSA market through its direct and channel partner offerings.

WEX also launched a new AI-driven claims processing tool that slashes reimbursement processing from days to minutes — a rare moment where FinTech buzzwords meet real impact. The automation reduces costs while improving the user experience — an important differentiator as benefits become a battleground for attracting talent.

Read more: WEX Corporate Payments Chief Says Virtual Cards Adoption Needs a Strategy Refresh 

Gunning for Growth

If there’s a wildcard in WEX’s portfolio, it’s corporate payments. The segment, which includes both embedded payments (mainly virtual cards used in travel and other verticals) and accounts payable (AP) automation, saw revenue decline 11.8% to $118.3 million.

The culprit: a major online travel agency customer restructuring its spend model — a drag that is now mostly behind the company.

But the company’s AP automation story is particularly compelling. WEX has increased its dedicated AP sales force by over 50% and is riding a wave of demand from mid-size and enterprise companies looking to digitize legacy payment workflows. With more than 140 new customers signed year-to-date and a record pipeline, this unit could quietly become a growth engine in its own right.

Meanwhile, the company is expanding its embedded payments offering into new verticals such as media, eCommerce and expense management. Owning a bank (WEX Bank) gives it an edge in these scenarios, allowing end-to-end integration that many FinTech challengers struggle to offer at scale.

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