The executive director of Saudi Payments, a Saudi Arabian Monetary Authority (SAMA) subsidiary, revealed on Tuesday that significant growth has been registered in the number of payments made using smart devices.
Figures show a 500% surge, Fahd Al-Akeel confirmed, adding that over 9,000 online stores now support payments made by the kingdom’s “Mada” service.
Al-Akeel added that point of sale operations grew by 76% with Mada’s e-commerce operations more than doubling in size.
Saudi Arabia, according to Al-Akeel, is the fastest growing in the world in terms of the number of points of sale during the period from 2012 to 2019. The kingdom registered a compound annual growth rate of 23%.
It is noteworthy that the expansion of the infrastructure for digital payments in Saudi Arabia has led to a steady and remarkable growth in the volume of digital transactions.
Al-Akeel noted that Saudi Payments is working to benefit from the economic opportunities available in the kingdom to enhance the role of digital payments in achieving economic development, and to facilitate the movement of trade exchange by developing an infrastructure for safe, reliable and consensual payment systems that enable banks and fintech companies to innovate products and services that contribute to easing and expediting financial transactions between companies, government agencies and individuals.
Saudi Payments is a major contributor to achieving the objectives of the Financial Sector Development Program, which is a part of the national plan for transformation Vision 2030.
As a subsidiary of SAMA, Saudi Payments is considered a key player in achieving the program’s objectives, which include an initiative to reduce the Saudi society’s dependency on cash and increase the proportion of digital financial transactions.
