Skytef

13/08/2018

Debit cards lead growth of payment methods in 2017

Banco Central (Central Bank - CB) announced today that the participation of debit cards in electronic transactions increased in 2017.  According to the agency, payments with this type of card accounted for 55.4% of electronic transactions last year, against 53.9% in 2016.

In a statement, the authority said that the popularization of debit cards is aligned with the parameters of Banco Central, which has sought to encourage electronic payments. "The participation of debit card operations has increased, which is aligned with the direction given by the CB, that says that debit card is increasingly used as a payment instrument," the agency said.

Debit cards led growth among all forms of electronic media. According to the CB, the number of active debit cards in Brazil increased from 101,283 million at the end of 2016 to 107,599 million at the end of last year, up 6.24%. Total credit cards went from 81.97 million to 83.52 million, an increase of 1.89%.
Regarding the number of transactions, total debt payments jumped from 6.8 billion to 7.9 billion in 12 months, up 16.2%. Total credit operations rose from 5.9 billion to 6.4 billion, up 8.5%.

Mobile devices
In the classification by access channels, the Central Bank survey revealed that, for the first time in history, transactions on mobile devices - smartphones, tablets and personal digital assistants - led bank transactions in 2017. Until the previous year, remote access to the websites of financial institutions (computer, home banking and office banking) were on the top.

Last year, 24.52 million financial transactions were made on mobile devices, versus 20.6 million remote access transactions and 11.24 million ATM operations. The traditional service channels (agencies and service stations) were well behind with 8.5 million transactions.

"In fact, there was a reduction in the number of transactions through traditional channels and transactions on mobile devices and correspondent banking increased," the BC reported in the statement.
Source: www.agenciabrasil.ebc.com.br