Number of credit card holders in India at all-time high, spends hit record Rs 1 lakh crore in March
At Rs 1,04,081 crore, online credit card spends crossed the Rs 1-lakh-crore mark for the first time in March. Online card spends rose 20% from about Rs 86,390 crore in March 2023, and 10% from Rs 94,774 crore in Feb 2024.
In March 2024, credit card spending online crossed the Rs 1 lakh crore mark for the first time. At a staggering Rs 1,04,081 crore, it represented a 20% increase from over Rs 86,390 crore in March 2023. The amount spent on credit cards online in March of this year increased by 10% from Rs 94,774 crore in February of 2024.
The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has released statistics for the month of March that shows a 19% increase in offline transactions (via point-of-sale machines) compared to the same period last year, totaling Rs 60,378 crore.
What is the total credit card spends in March 2024?
In March 2024, the total amount spent on credit cards was Rs 1,64,586 crore, which is a 20% increase from Rs 1,37,310 crore the previous year and almost 11% more than Rs 1.49 lakh crores in February of this year.
How much credit card spends in FY24?
Credit card spending increased by 27% year over year to Rs 18.26 lakh crore in FY24 from about Rs 14 lakh crore in the same time the previous year.
Why credit card spends witnessed a spike?
The end of the fiscal year and festival purchases in March 2024 contributed significantly to the increase in credit card spending that month. According to the report, the nation's credit card count climbed by 20% to 10.2 crore in March 2024, after surpassing 10 crore for the first time in February 2024. Compared to a year earlier, it was 8.5 crore greater.
The total number of credit cards issued by banks across India has increased to 101 million in March 2024. It was 100.60 million at the end of February this year.
In March 2024, point-of-sale transactions rose 28 per cent year-on-year to 18 crore in March, while online payments rose 33 per cent to 16.4 crore. Transaction volume outpacing growth in value indicates that customers are increasingly using cards for low-value payments.