BAKU, Azerbaijan, March 3. More than half of the bank card transactions in the Azerbaijani market fell on the international payment company Visa, Senior Director, Regional Manager of Visa in Azerbaijan Nurlan Hajiyev said in an interview with Trend.
According to him, the implementation of creative initiatives that guaranteed the simplicity and security of using cards contributed to the dominance of transactions with Visa bank cards in the Azerbaijani market.
"Safety is one of the foundations of innovation. Visa pays great attention to this, and consequently, speed, simplicity, and security are the drivers that we bring to the Azerbaijani market. By implementing projects for accepting bank card payments not only by POS terminals but also by mobile devices, we are increasing our share in the local market," he said.
Hajiyev said that Visa also has social responsibility by developing, expanding, and simplifying products for all segments and economic entities.
According to the Central Bank of Azerbaijan, Visa's share of the total volume of transactions by the end of 2022 was about 60.5 percent.
The volume of non-cash payments in Azerbaijan amounted to 58.56 billion manat ($34.45 billion) in 2022, which is 21.1 billion manat ($12.4 billion) or 56.26 percent more than in 2021. A total of 562.1 million transactions worth 54.2 billion manat ($31.8 billion) were carried out through debit cards (an increase of 54.9 percent), and 80.8 million transactions worth 4.3 billion manat ($2.5 billion) through credit cards (an increase of 78.3 percent).
The number of payment cards in circulation equaled 13.2 million as of January 1, 2023, which is 20.1 percent more than in 2021. The growth of debit cards was 18.7 percent, and that of credit cards - 29.4 percent.