Visa Europe exceeds 7 mln cards in Romania, adds 23.6 percent on transactions

Visa Europe, the payments technology company, reached 7.1 million cards in Romania in 2012 and registered a 23.6 percent increase in  processed transactions – POS and online – at Romanian merchants, as a growing number of Romanians use their card to pay for daily expenses.

Visa said the average POS transaction value remained on a downward trend, reaching EUR 36.5, signaling that Visa cards are used for smaller and regular payments. Spend on Visa cards at merchants moved up by 23.5 percent.

“2012 was a strong year for Visa in Romania, although the economic environment was very difficult,” said Catalin Cretu, general manager Romania, Visa Europe.

“We exceeded seven million Visa cards in Romania, which is a very good result, we consider it an important one.”

The company was helped by the commercial segment to grow the number of Visa cards in Romania by 4 percent to 7.1 million in 2012.

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The debit cards segment – the core growth area for Visa Europe’s portfolio in Romania, grew by 20 percent in volume and on the number of transactions at merchants.  Meanwhile, the credit cards segment added 40 percent on transactions and 32 percent in the amount spent at merchants.

Visa Europe registered a 20 percent growth in business cards that target SMEs and large corporates. Transactions worth EUR 3.6 billion were handled in this segment.

The number of transactions handled by Visa Europe grew by 60,000 to 568,000 daily operations in Romania.

Visa processed transactions worth EUR 17.5 billion in Romania, representing commercial transactions and cash withdrawals from ATMs.

Mobile payments to be launched in Romania

In Europe, the amount spend on Visa debit cards exceeded EUR 1 trillion for the first time, which was an increase of 8 percent for the year ending in September 2012. Online spending on Visa cards exceeded EUR 202 billion.

Visa Europe said that EUR 1 in every EUR 6,75 spent in Europe in on its cards. It reached 466 million cards in Europe.

The company will roll out this year the V.me, the first integrated digital wallet, in UK, France and Spain. It expects to reach 70 million contactless cards in 2013.

“One third of all consumers will be using the V.me wallet by 2020,” said Berna Ulman, general manager for Turkey, Romania & Israel.  She predicted that 50 percent of all transactions will be mobile by 2020.

Cretu said that several banks will lauch mobile payments in Romania this year.

Ovidiu Posirca