Italians Start Playing at Cards

Recent surveys show that Italians are growing more confident with plastic money. According a Bank of Italy survey published in January 2012, traditional payment instruments (cash and checks) are being substituted by credit, ATM, and prepaid cards. About 71% of Italian households owned at least one payment card at the end of 2010. The diffusion of ATM cards continues unabated, growing from 63.6% in 2008 to almost 69% in 2010, while credit card penetration is stable at 32% of Italian households. Prepaid cards are the fastest growing segment, jumping from 7.3% in 2008 to 12.1% in 2010. In the latter year, the average Italian resident made 66 payments with instruments other than cash. This unfavorably compared with an average of 176 in the eurozone (2009 data). The average monthly expenditure paid in cash by Italians is €895, equal to 42.7% of total spending. In 2004-2006 it was about 48%. The analysis highlights that Italian high-income regions display a lower use of electronic money with respect to other European regions having similar per capita incomes.
The comparatively high use of cash in Italy is mirrored by the intensive use of ATMs to get cash. In 2010, the number of withdrawals from bank and postal ATMs has grown, as well as the average sum, €180 per operation, well above the European average (€120 in the eurozone and €109 in the EU). Online payments have grown, but they still represent only 6% of non-cash operations. Mobile payments are still at an early stage. Only the entry of new market actors will favor the cell phone purchase of digital goods and services.
It's interesting to note that the circulation of credit cards is slowing down, although the number of holders has remained constant. In order to explain this fact, sociological and market factors are must be take into account. The principle of non-dispersion of energy is also applied to the credit card portfolio. People want simplicity when dealing with the financial market, and this means less checking accounts, less insurance policies, and less cards. Thus the share of those having more than one credit card is shrinking.
Such get-back-to-basics attitude improves credit card use in terms of satisfaction and appropriateness. It can be finally shown that it's demand pulling the positioning of non-cash instruments of payment, rather than supply, which should have been faster and smarter in pushing the process.