Transactions processed by Iran’s electronic payment settlement network, known as Shaparak, declined 1.37% in volume during the last calendar month to March 19.
The network said it processed 2.28 billion transactions worth 3,281.7 trillion rials ($20.77 billion) during the month to post a 1.22% rise in value, according to Shaparak’s monthly report published on its website.
The transactions value rose 11.65% compared to the same period last year and in volume terms it showed 2.8% growth annually.
The report attributes annual hike in the value of transactions mainly to rising inflation, increase in the number of receiving instruments and debit cards plus the growing tendency among the public to use electronic payment tools instead of cash.
Shaparak usually presents the real value of transactions after adjusting for inflation in its monthly reports. However, it could not present the real value of transactions in the present report as the Statistical Center of Iran did not release inflation data for the reviewed period.
Electronic payment services are available to users via three main platforms, namely internet, cellphone and point of sale (POS) devices.
The number of instruments for processing payments showed 0.83% increase compared to a month earlier, reaching a total of 10.79 million.
With the biggest contribution to growth, the number of mobile instruments and POS devices in shops increased 1.26% and 0.92%, respectively.
The number of internet payment gateways fell 0.34% during the period under review.
As is usually the case, POS devices topped the list of instruments with the biggest market share accounting for 77.22%.
This was followed by mobile instruments with 12.23% and online payment gateways 10.55%.
Processing more than 2.07 billion transactions with total value of 2,829.46 trillion rials ($17.9 billion), POS devices accounted for 90.97% of the total number of transactions.
Second on the list were online gateways that accounted for 5.05% of the total number of transactions with more than 115.07 million transactions. This was followed by mobile instruments at 3.99%.
In terms of services offered by Shaparak, figures show that 84.66% of transactions were related to goods and services.
“Buying cellphone recharges and paying bills” accounted for 9.36% of all processed transactions during the month under review. More than 5.98% of the transactions were conducted for “checking account balances”.
Main PSPs
Shaparak also reflected on the performance of payment service providers in its report.
Accordingly, Beh Pardakht Mellat, a Bank Mellat-affiliated PSP firm, ranked first in terms of number of processed transactions, accounting for 22.48% of all transactions.
This was followed by Saman Electronic Payment, a Bank Saman-affiliate, which accounts for 18.99% of all processed transactions.
In terms of value, Beh Pardakht Mellat held the biggest share with 23.78% of the total value of transactions. Saman Electronic Payment was next, representing 16.47% of the overall value of transactions.
Asan Pardakht had the highest number of payments via internet gateways and mobile instruments and Beh Pardakht Mellat was first in terms of transactions via POS devices.
