Mobile wallets bounce back after slump, record 2nd highest transactions in May

In what could be seen as mobile wallets strides to bounce back from mandatory know-your-customer (KYC) requirements setback three months ago, the value of transactions through them have witnessed a 21 per cent rise in May from April.

In May, transactions worth Rs 14,170 crore took place from Rs 11,695 crore in April, according to the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) data quoted by Mint report. Around 325.78 million transactions took place. This is the second highest transactions after January, which recorded 326.30 million.

The rise in transactions is seen as a resilient effort from mobile wallets, whose transactions saw downward sliding to Rs 10,097 crore in March.

In April this year, mobile wallets showed 279 million transactions against 268 million in the previous month. The number was still lesser than 310 million transactions wallets clocked in February, before the end of full KYC deadline.

Besides, Debit and credit card transactions have also witnessed a marginal rise in value and volume. The value of card transaction touched Rs 3.59 trillion from Rs 3.55 in April. Whereas the volume of card transactions saw a rise of one per cent to Rs 1,238.58 million from Rs 1225.75 Mn.

Mobile banking transactions went up by around 7 percent to 266.94 million in May from 250 million in April. The value of transactions increased 0.40 Tn to Rs 1.76 trillion in May from April.

This month, RBI is also expected to issue operational guidelines on interoperability. The central bank is reported to be in the final stage of releasing operational rules.

The move will make inter-wallet transactions possible for users, who will be able to transfer money between wallets.

In the last few years, acceptance of digital payment modes has grown. The mobile wallet interoperability guidelines are expected to enable grounds for several smaller players. It will be introduced in phases, after the adoption of the common standard by wallets, starting with all full-KYC wallets, as per the RBI.

Last year in October, GlobalData in a report said that the total amount of mobile wallet transactions in India will grow further to surpass Rs 1 trillion marks in 2018.