Mobile-based payments will be resilient and overtake card payments in India, with the covid-19-induced economic slowdown likely to put a pause on the rapid rise of cashless payments in 2020, S&P Global Market Intelligence said in a report on Tuesday.
“High growth rates in cashless payments seen in recent years are unlikely to repeat amid an economic slowdown due to the novel coronavirus pandemic,” said Sampath Sharma Nariyanuri, fintech analyst at the firm. “However, we expect mobile payments to be more resilient and will gain a bigger lead over card payments, as their uptake will accelerate due to ongoing social distancing measures and concerns over usage of cash and plastic.”
India’s push towards cashless payments accelerated in 2019 as card and mobile payments as a percentage of GDP rose to 20% in the December quarter, from 13% a year earlier, the report said. India ranks favourably among countries with instant payment schemes, processing five times more transactions than the second-largest market based on analysis of real-time payment volumes. Mobile payments comprising account-to-account transfers and payments from stored-value accounts rose 163% to $287 billion in 2019.
