The Central Bank of the Republic of Türkiye (CBRT), in an analysis published on its blog, Merkezin Guncesi (Central Bank’s Diary), announced that the widespread use of digital payment channels and high inflation increased the cost of carrying cash, which accelerated credit card usage.
According to the analysis, there was a rapid increase in credit card balances as interest rates lagged behind inflation from the end of 2021 to the third quarter of 2023. Credit card borrowing opportunities sparked this growth, but we also observed a real-term increase in debit card spending.
Credit card spending volume reaches ₺12.8 trillion
Credit card spending volume reached ₺12.8 trillion ($374.8 billion). Since 2015, credit card spending has doubled in real terms, while debit card spending has tripled. In the same period, contactless payment transactions made a huge leap, rising from only 2 million in 2015 to over 1 billion monthly contactless payment transactions by 2024.
The CBRT emphasized that policymakers should take these new behavior patterns into account and stated that changes in consumption habits, not the need to borrow, were what drove this increase in card usage.
