In 2017, payment cards in Georgia remained the main retail payment instrument. By the end of the year, their number reached 9.1 million, major part of which (92%) are debit cards and 8% are credit cards. Majority of issued cards – 83% – are international cards.
MasterCard – 47 %
Visa – 28 %
UPI – 7 %
AmEx – 1 %
The rest 17% are local cards. It is notable that the total number of Georgia cards, compared to December 2016, has reduced by 3%. Number of issued Visa cards has reduced by 21% and of local cards – by 9%. According to the National Bank of Georgia, number of MasterCard cards increased by 11%, of AmEx cards – by 24% and of UPI cards – by 25%.
Three major banks of the country are the issuers of 96% of cards.
In 2017, number of transactions conducted by means of payment cards was 179 million, and the value was 19.0 bln GEL, which is 32% more than the number of transactions conducted in 2016 and 24% more than the value indicator.
96% of conducted transactions and 93% of the amount were within the country. Only 4% of the number and 7% of the amount were abroad. In 2017, the share of payment transactions in trade and service facilities in total operations conducted with Georgian cards is still increasing. Namely, this rate made 66%, accordingly, 34% was the number of operations of cash withdrawal. From the point of view of the amount, the share of POS terminals in card transactions was 23% and 77% was of cash withdrawal.
