Following last week’s announcement, the Payments Security Task Force (PST) has today released an update on the US’s chip-enabled cards roll-out.
Eight financial institutions, which make up half of the US payment card volume, estimate that 63 per cent of their credit and debit cards will be EMV chip-enabled. That number increases to 98 per cent by 2017. These numbers reaffirm August 2014’s initial prognosis.
The numbers are indicative of US’s resolve to strengthen payment security. The chip technology protects payments made in-store by generating a one-time code for every transaction. This makes it almost impossible to create counterfeit cards.
The US is famously the last G20 country to adopt chip-enabled cards. Between January-December 2014 only 0.12 per cent of card-present transactions were EMV. In the same period, in Europe Zone 1 the number was at 96.60 per cent.
A survey of acquirers taking part in the Payments Security Task Force, indicates that nearly half (47 per cent) of US merchant terminals will be EMV chip-enabled by the end of 2015.
“The industry is delivering on its commitment to continue to provide a secure and convenient way to pay. These numbers show real movement from plans to action as issuers, merchants and others in the payments system engage collaboratively to bring chip cards to the U.S,” said Chris McWilton, president of MasterCard’s North America Markets.
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