Ranked: Top 10 Consumer Lending Countries

Source: Euromonitor International 

Consumer credit and gross lending is growing across the world, with credit cards leading the way. While companies open up to credit cards, the challenge will be to reach markets that mainly use cash.

KEY FINDINGS

• The US has grosser lending than Western Europe (1,235,258.4).
• The single largest region by total card payment value and number of cards in circulation continued to be Asia Pacific followed by North America and Western Europe.
• China is expected to increase card payment value the most with an additional USD2.7 trillion over the next five years.
• The number of banked consumers in the 47 researched markets increased by 100 million from 2016 to 2017.
• China and the US are going to drive global m-commerce value over the forecast period as mobile payments become more common.
• Despite significant investment in increasing card security in the US, total value lost to fraud on cards increased from 2016 to 2017.
• Consumers are expected to spend more on credit cards presenting a sizeable opportunity in key markets for the largest card issuers or for emerging payment companies if they can offer a similar product.

Asia Pacific and North America account for most card value growth

While card and electronic payments are increasing in use, total paper value is expected to decline by USD392 billion over 2017-2022 in absolute value terms. With the other functions increasing significantly, this amounts to an eight percentage point reduction in share of total consumer payment value. Eastern Europe has the highest expected CAGR for card payments over the forecast period with 10%. This is partly attributed to the current low base of card adoption but also due to government policy incentivising paper alternatives. Other paper payment value is expected to have the greatest decline in value with a negative 4.7% CAGR expected over the forecast period.

Continued growth for card payment value over forecast period

Card payment value continued to accelerate from 2016 to 2017 with an increase of USD1.4 trillion. The 5.8% growth of card value from 2016 to 2017 was an improvement from the previous period of 4.3% but is expected to further moderate over the forecast period. The lower growth is in part attributed to slower expected card growth in the world’s largest market by total payment value, China. Growth is expected to exceed the growth of consumer payments overall due to cash conversion efforts. However, with consistent growth over the forecast period total card payment value is projected to reach USD32.1 trillion by 2022. This expected growth represents more than a doubling of global payment value from 2012.