Paying With Plastic Becoming a Norm in Iran

The nationwide payment settlement network in Iran, Shaparak, processed more than 2.691 billion payments worth 4,190.8 trillion rials ($16.37 billion based on open market forex rates) in the last calendar month to Dec 21.
Transactions were up 19.13% in volume and 50.16% in value compared to the 2.259 billion transactions worth at 2,790 trillion rials ($10.9 billion) handled by Shaparak during the same period last year. 
Shaparak said rise in the number transactions was due largely to the increase in payment receiving instruments and debit cards plus the growing tendency among the people to use plastic cards instead of cash.
Shaparak also presented figures in real value terms to adjust for inflation. Accordingly, the real value of transactions registered 3.71% growth YOY. 
With more than 12.37 million payment instruments operating in the reviewed month, the total number of instruments showed 19.74% growth compared to previous year's 10.33 million.