China witnessed 1.67 billion mobile payment transactions last year worth an incredible 9.64 trillion Chinese Yen (CNY) ($1.6 trillion), according to the People’s Bank of China.
In an indication of the booming popularity of mobile payments in China, the number of transactions soared 213 percent year-on-year while the transaction value leaped by 317 percent.
Mobile payments grew the fastest among all the e-payment methods recorded by the central bank last year – which include online payments via computers, as well as telephone payments.
Compared to mobile payments, the value of e-payment transactions in total increased by only 29.46 percent – to reach CNY1,075 trillion ($177 trillion) in 2013.
Mobile payments have increased in China in part due to Chinese Internet giant Tencent rolling out an update to its mobile messaging app Weixin (known as WeChat outside of the country) that incorporated payments.
Subsequently, early this year, Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba integrated its payments service with China’s version of Twitter, Sina Weibo, so users can connect their Alipay accounts with their Weibo accounts and buy items without having to log in.
The sheer number of mobile internet users in the country – 500 million at the end of last year, according to the China Internet Network Information Center (CNNIC) – will surely continue to provide growth for the mobile payments industry.
Source: The Next Web
