Debit Card Growth Influencers

The Payments Card Center of the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia has released a new workshop summary titled "Supply- and Demand-Side Developments Influencing Growth in the Debit Market" (PDF). "On August 3, 2006, Ronald Congemi, senior vice president of strategic industry relations for First Data Corporation, led a PCC workshop to examine developments on both the supply side and demand side that are influencing growth in the debit card market. On the supply side, Congemi addressed banks’ increasing recognition of the importance of payments-related revenues in their institutional profit and loss statements, the effect of differences in interchange fees between PIN and signature debit, and the greater focus on cost structures for debit card issuers. On the demand side, he considered how changes in consumer payment preferences and innovations in the debit market were influencing consumer behavior and payment choice and, ultimately, competition among payment alternatives." [Editor's note: A most useful review of the perspectives of a leading PIN-debit industry veteran. One interesting data point from the paper: "in the first quarter of 2006, the number of PIN-POS debit locations had reached 64 percent of the total locations." Highly recommended reading!]