Investors appear eager to buy stocks of payment-processing companies as evidenced Thursday by Shift4 Payments Inc. pricing its initial public offering at $23 per share, nearly 10% above the high end of the $19 to $21 range it had expected just days earlier.

Shift4’s shares opened late Friday morning on the New York Stock Exchange at $33.10, according to Yahoo! Finance, fully 44% above the IPO price. Just before noon Eastern time they were going for $33.21. Shares trade under the ticker symbol FOUR.

“There has always been a big appetite from the investment community in terms of investing and/or acquiring payment-related players,” Jared Drieling, senior director of consulting and market intelligence at Omaha, Neb.-based The Strawhecker Group, says by email.

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