ARMENIAN MARKET OF PLASTIC CARDS GREW BY 30%

ArmInfo
15.02.2010

ArmInfo.In January 2010 the number of active cards in the Armenian
market of plastic cards grew by 30% as compared with January 2009
and amounted to 456594. Armenian Card (ArCa) told ArmInfo that
nevertheless, in January 2010 the number of cards issued by ArCa
member banks declined by 11384 cards as compared with December 2009.

As of 1 Feb 2010, the number of active plastic ArCa cards totalled
283050 (annual growth being 38%), Visa – 112280 (annual growth being
10%), MasterCard – 61264 (annual growth being 35%). Over January
operation with a total of 313375 cards were carried out, of them
204818 ArCa, 40542 MasterCard, and 68015 Visa.

According to the source, as of 1 Feb 2010, the number of trade and
service points (bancomats exclusive) operating in the Armenian Card
system amounted to 2257. There were 2592 POS-terminals in the trade
and service points. At the same time, 2549 of the total number of
POS-terminals served ArCa cards, 1732 – Visa, 2158 – MasterCard,
and 24 – American Express (Amex) cards. Over January the number
of trade and service points increased by 53, and POS-terminals –
by 38. As of 1 Feb 2010, the number of bancomats in the ArCa system
was 588 as against 465 over the same period of 2009.