KARACHI: To promote the digital economy, the State Bank of Pakistan will provide a Rs3.5 billion targeted support to financial institutions for encouraging merchant on-boarding on Raast and digital QR Code transactions.
“The Government has allocated a subsidy of PKR 3.5 billion for Raast P2M QR Code based transactions to be conducted during the period from September 1, 2025, to June 30, 2026,” the central bank circulated here on Wednesday.
The subsidy has been approved by the federal government, under the Prime Minister’s Cashless Economy initiative, for the SBP Regulated Entities- all Banks, Micro Finance Banks, Electronic Money Institutions and Payment Service Operators and Providers- for promoting onboarding of merchants on Raast and enabling them to digitally receive payments through Raast QR Code, a circular by SBP’s Payment Systems Policy and Oversight Department stated.
The subsidy rate is determined as 0.5% of the value of each Raast P2M QR Code based transaction or PKR 100, whichever is lower; while both acquiring and issuing financial institutions, Merchant Service Provider and Customer Service Provider, will equally share the amount. Besides the subsidy, the REs may charge up to 0.25% of the transaction value for on boarding and servicing the merchants.
The subsidy payments shall be made to REs on a quarterly basis and in case the total subsidy amount exceeds the annual ceiling of PKR 3.5 billion, the subsidy rate will be revised downward to ensure that each RE gets the subsidy at an equal rate within the budget ceiling, the circular read.
The SBP advised all the regulated entities to ensure compliance with the prescribed process and maintain complete records for verification and audit purposes.
