Share of e-commerce in Azerbaijan approaches 88% of cashless payments

In September of this year, the volume of cashless payments in Azerbaijan increased by 24% compared to the same period last year, reaching 8.898 billion manats ($5.234 billion), Report, informs citing the Central Bank of Azerbaijan.

Some 7.808 billion manats ($4.593 billion) of this amount came from e-commerce transactions.

Payments totaling 1.086 billion manats ($639 million) were made via POS terminals, while 4 million manats ($2.35 million) were processed through self-service terminals.

Since the beginning of the year, domestic cashless transactions made with payment cards accounted for 67.4% of all card operations.

As of October 1, the number of payment cards in Azerbaijan reached 21.368 million units, an increase of 1.1% compared to the previous month, 7.4% compared to the beginning of the year, and 12.9% compared to the same period last year.

Over the past year, the number of debit cards in the country rose by 15.6% to 19.252 million, while the number of credit cards declined by 6.9% to 2.116 million. In September, the turnover of these cards amounted to 12.575 billion manats ($7.397 billion) and 778 million manats ($458 million), respectively.

During the reporting period, the number of ATMs in the country increased by 8.8% to 3,496 units (1,879 in Baku), and the number of POS terminals rose by 56.5% to 161,915 units (100,040 in Baku).

Currently, there are three main types of international payment systems: card-based, electronic, and universal payment systems. The five most popular international card payment systems worldwide are Visa International, MasterCard International, American Express, Diners Club International, and JCB Card. These financial giants also cooperate with banks in Azerbaijan.