UnionPay, China’s largest payment card company, surpassed Visa for the first time in 2022, securing 40.03% of global debit card transactions.
UnionPay debit cards represented a market share of 40.03%, surpassing the Visa payment system, which stood at 38.78%, according to a report by Nilson Report, cited by the Chinese official newspaper Global Times.
Debit card transactions represented 63.88% of all purchase transactions made in 2022, reflecting the growing preference of consumers for this form of payment.
UnionPay, whose cards in Portugal are issued by the Millennium bcp bank, maintained its position as the leader in spending on goods and services through debit cards for ten consecutive years.
Visa’s debit card transaction market share has steadily declined, falling from 80% in 2011 to 39.53% in 2021, according to the report’s data, contrasting with an increase from near zero to 38.68% for UnionPay during the same period of time.
UnionPay’s subsidiary, UnionPay International, has established strategic alliances with more than 2,500 financial institutions worldwide, enabling the company to expand the use of its cards in 181 countries and regions.
The Chinese currency, the yuan, has also undergone a gradual process of internationalization, becoming the fifth most used payment currency, the third most used in commercial transactions and the fifth most used reserve currency.
Last month, the yuan outperformed the US dollar in China’s cross-border transactions for the first time, reaching an all-time high of 48%, while the use of the dollar fell to 47%.
In 2010, China relied almost exclusively on the dollar for this type of operation, with 83% use.
China wants to increase the use of the yuan in cross-border transactions and has signed agreements with Brazil, Chile, Argentina, Saudi Arabia and Russia to promote the share of their currency in world trade, which currently stands at 2.3%, according to the system. . Fast.
Source: TSF
