KARACHI: The State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) has released its Quarterly Payment System Review (QPSR) for the second quarter, October – December 2020, of the fiscal year 2020-21 today, which shows strong growth in digital financial transactions in the country.
During Q2FY21, 296.7 million e-Banking transactions valuing Rs21.4 trillion were carried out, registering a growth of 24 percent by volume and 22 percent by value, over the same quarter last year.
Most of the uptake in e-banking transactions were seen in internet and mobile banking. The volume of mobile banking transactions reached 44 million, (up 147 percent) valuing Rs.1.12 trillion (up 192 percent) compared to 17.8 million transactions valuing 382.5 billion in the same quarter, last year.
The number of registered mobile phone banking users reached 9.4 million accounting an increase of 5%. Similarly, 22 million internet banking transactions valuing PKR 1.3 trillion were recorded during this period compared to Rs. 1.1 trillion in the previous quarter.
Card-based transactions on e-commerce portals also increased substantially, with e-commerce merchants processing 5.6 million transactions through payment cards amounting to Rs15 billion compared to 3.9 million valuing 11.9 billion in the first quarter of the current fiscal year.
The total number of payment cards issued in the country stood at 44 million out of which 27.6 million are debit cards and 1.7 million are credit cards. Further, 7.6 million were social welfare cards have been issued by banks on behalf of BISP, EOBI and other government organizations.
