Plastic cards market is developing dynamically. The number of banking plastic cards issued by Georgian commercial banks in circulation by December 1, 2008 amounted to 3.5 million, 1.8 times more than the figure for the same date of 2007. Out of this amount 85.4 percent are debit cards, as compared to 92.9 percent a year ago. The change of structure of plastic cards market is a result of fast growing demand for credit cards. While the growth of the number of debit cards for the past year constituted 62.6 percent, the number of credit cards increased 3.6 times over the same period.

Popularity of VISA cards is still growing. They account for 80.5 percent of all cards in circulation, followed by EUROCARD/MASTERCARD with 12.9 percent, while local cards take up the remaining 6.6 percent. It should be noted that the share of VISA cards among the total amount of cards in circulation increased by 7.0 percentage points during the last year.

In November of the current year 2.5 million operations were carried out with plastic cards issued by resident commercial banks, total volume of which increased by 7.9 percent compared to the corresponding period of 2007 and constituted 312.6 million GEL. Out of the total volume of operations with plastic cards issued by resident commercial banks 94.6 percent account for the operations carried out within Georgian territory (including operations by internet) and 5.4 percent account for the operations carried out with the same cards abroad.

The usage of plastic cards in ATMs and POS-terminals of Georgian banks is also noteworthy. During the reporting month 874.7 thousand operations were carried out using ATMs and POS-terminals of the resident commercial banks, total value of which made up 188.2 million GEL. 88.1 percent out of this amount fall on cards issued by resident banks and 11.9 percent - on cards issued by non-resident banks.

Current statistical information is published on the statistics page of the NBG's website