Brazil Payment Card Market Update

June 12, 2012 - PRLog -- Boston, MA -- With 687 million network-branded cards in circulation, Brazil is the world's second largest payment card market.Growing rapidly, the market is experiencing major changes. The acquiring market is seeing fundamental changes as exclusive acquiring agreements with the two major international card networks Visa and MasterCard come to an end, resulting in increasing competition and declining merchant discount rates. The retailer credit card market is also facing increasing competition from cobranded cards issued by banks in partnerships with retailers.

Mercator Advisory Group's latest report, Brazil Payment Cards Market Update, offers a comprehensive overview of the Brazilian credit, debit, and retailer card markets. It addresses the country's consumer spending, credit markets, personal credit information system, major consumer credit bureaus, and the overall card acceptance market. The report examines developments in recent years and provides a brief survey of the major players in the Brazilian payment card market, including card networks, issuers, acquirers, and processors. Changes in industry dynamics are addressed including new acquirers in the market and the emergence of new card networks such as Elo (the evolving merchant acquiring market that developed after regulation ended card network acquiring exclusivity). The report also looks at the three major card segments in Brazil: credit cards, debit cards, and retailer cards.

"The Brazilian payments market enjoyed rapid growth in the past decade, benefiting from the booming economy and consumer credit market," Terry Xie, Director of Mercator Advisory Group's International Advisory Service on the report, commented. "Growth has slowed a bit over the past two years, as the global economic downturn has finally taken its toll on the Brazilian market. The rising inflation and consumer debt level will likely force consumers to cut back their spending, which thrived on readily available credit, and banks need to protect themselves as well. We expect an adjustment in the market in the short term, but the long-term perspective of the Brazilian payments market remains very promising."

Highlights of the research findings include:

Factors contributing to the growth of the Brazilian payments market

Comparison of card penetration and usage with that of more advanced markets such as the U.S. and the U.K.

Presentation of data on the strong growth recorded in recent years in all three major payment card segments: network-branded credit, debit, and retailer credit cards

Analysis of the effects of major changes the acquiring market has experienced causing overall pricing to the merchant to drop quickly

New developments in the card network market, such as the new domestic network Elo and the new evaluation points of existing local card brands

Near term and future projections for the payments market

This report contains 34 pages and 15 exhibits.

Companies and services mentioned in this report include: Banco Bradesco, Banco Itau Unibanco, Banco Santander, CEF,Cielo, Citibank, CSU CardSystem, Elavon, Elo, Equifax do Brasil, First Data, FIS, GetNet, HiperCard, HSBC, MasterCard, Orbitall, Redecard, Serasa Experian, TecBan, TSYS, Visa, among others.

Members of Mercator Advisory Group's International Advisory Service have access to this report as well as the upcoming research for the year ahead, presentations, analyst access and other membership benefits.

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About Mercator Advisory Group
Mercator Advisory Group is the leading, independent research and advisory services firm exclusively focused on the payments and banking industries. We deliver pragmatic and timely research and advice designed to help our clients uncover the most lucrative opportunities to maximize revenue growth and contain costs. Our clients range from the world's largest payment issuers, acquirers, processors, merchants and associations to leading technology providers and investors. Mercator Advisory Group is also the publisher of the online payments and banking news and information portal PaymentsJournal.com.