UPI To Fuel Indian e-commerce With $150 Bn By 2026 As Cash Transactions Decline: Report
Unified payments interface (UPI)-based transactions break continuous records, India’s e-commerce market is projected to grow from USD 83 billion in 2022 to USD 150 billion in 2026, according to the '2023 Global Payments Report' by global financial technology leader FIS on Thursday.
The report highlights that UPI recorded the biggest transaction volume as of January 2023, with a year-on-year growth of 74.1 per cent, and a growth in digital wallets from 5 per cent in 2019 to 35 per cent of POS value in 2022. After a decline from 71 per cent of POS transaction value in 2019 to just 27 per cent in 2022, India has emerged as a global leader in payments with its developed next-generation real-time payments (RTP) infrastructure.
The study also identifies that UPI plays a key role in helping e-commerce account-to-account (A2A) payments grow to USD 12 billion, up 53 per cent from 2021 to 2022. Phil Pomford, General Manager APAC, Worldpay Merchant Solutions at FIS, said that UPI is driving consumers to adopt cash-free transactions, boosting financial inclusion and making India a global leader in payments.
The data further reports an expected decline of 34 per cent in transaction value and a rise in digital wallets by 88 per cent by 2026, and a growth in e-commerce by 82 per cent by the same year, providing a greater digital payments boost. While cash is still prevalent, a majority of peer-to-peer transactions are now conducted through UPI.
Moreover, the development of real-time payment schemes by other central banks and the cooperation between central banks are also helping to fuel cross-border commerce, providing merchants with significant opportunities for growth moving forward, according to Pomford.
Earlier this month, Reserve Bank of India (RBI) Governor Shaktikanta Das had also highlighted the growth of UPI in the past 12 months, with daily transactions crossing 36 crore, up from 24 crore in February 2022, and a value transaction worth Rs. 6.27 lakh crore.
