The rate of issuance of new bank cards in some CIS countries showed a significant increase compared to the second quarter of 2021 after the withdrawal of Visa and Mastercard payment systems from Russia. RBC reports.
According to analysts, the most significant growth in the second quarter of 2022 is registered in Kyrgyzstan — for the year, the number of cards of international payment systems increased by 39.7 percent to 1,200,000 cards year-on-year.
The statistics includes Visa, Mastercard, UnionPay and the Russian Zolotaya Korona systems.
The number of Visa and Mastercard cards in Kazakhstan increased by 7.86 percent over the year, but this is the minimum growth rate in recent years.
The Bank of Uzbekistan showed an increase of 26.2 percent up to 29.9 million cards.
The number of Visa and Mastercard cards in Armenia for the second quarter increased by 16.2 percent. The growth reached 11.52 percent in Belarus, in Tajikistan in May (data for June are not yet available) — 28 percent compared to the same period last year.
After the start of the military special operation of the Russian Federation in Ukraine, the Visa and Mastercard systems announced the shutdown of Russian banks that fell under sanctions. On March 6, Visa and Mastercard announced suspension of activities in Russia. Transactions on their cards are no longer available outside the country.
