Philippines – In 2023, real-time payment transactions in the Philippines experienced a 24% year-on-year (YoY) growth, with transaction volumes reaching 777 million, according to a report by ACI Worldwide.
The report also projects that the volume will soar to 1.54 billion by 2028. The real-time payments’ share of all digital payments in the country is projected to grow to 58.7% by 2028, while its transaction value is expected to reach USD 209.6 billion in the same year.
As of 2023, real-time payments accounted for 47.2% of all Philippine digital payments, with a transaction value of USD 89.5 billion.
The surge in digital payments, including real-time transactions, in the Philippines accelerated during the COVID-19 pandemic, prompting a shift towards a cashless economy. The report highlights that this shift is driven by growing consumer demand for simpler, faster, and more secure transactions, with Filipino consumers citing these as the primary reasons for adopting digital payment tools.
ACI Worldwide’s report also identified a strong correlation between the growth of real-time payments and mobile wallet adoption. The Philippines ranks fifth globally in mobile wallet adoption, with 88% of Filipinos using a mobile wallet in the past year. The report further revealed that QR codes, mobile wallets, and bank accounts are the primary authorization methods used by Filipino consumers to initiate real-time payments.
Meanwhile, the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) plans to join the Regional Payment Connectivity initiative, linking ASEAN countries under a single QR code system. This move, aimed at enabling real-time cross-border payments, is part of the central bank’s broader strategy to promote financial inclusivity and digital payments, potentially reducing remittance costs and boosting the economy.
Leslie Choo, senior vice president and managing director for APAC at ACI Worldwide, commented, “Real-time payments hold the potential to facilitate greater economic growth and financial inclusion in the Philippines by eliminating payment friction and injecting greater liquidity in the financial system. As Filipinos continue to embrace digitization, we encourage the local banks and financial institutions to harness technological innovations that will enable them to fully leverage the capabilities of real-time transactions.”
“Real-time payments are now a real-world reality, and banks have the opportunity to innovate where real-time payments sit in the customer journey and the end-to-end payments landscape to provide a differentiated experience. At ACI Worldwide, we want to collaborate with banks, merchants, and billers in the Philippines and around the world to enable them to tap into emerging use cases of real-time payments through payment modernization and transformation,” Choo added.
