E-payment transactions down 21% to N263.78trn in Q2’20 on Covid-19 observance, says NBS

A total of 2.160 billion transactions valued at N263.78 trillion were recorded in the second quarter of 2020, data on electronic payment channels in the Nigerian banking sector have revealed. The figure represents a decline of 21.15 per cent, quarter on quarter, from N334.53 trillion posted in the first quarter of 2020, on the back of the coronavirus pandemic which resulted in the nationwide lockdown and led to a rise in the use of alternative banking services such as mobile app and USSD transfers, selected banking sector data from the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) show.

A further analysis of the data as contained on the NBS data warehouse shows that total cheque transactions during the period stood at a value of N2.286 trillion as at the end of June 2020, indicating an 11.75 per cent change when the first two quarters of 2020 are compared.

Also, the total transactions carried out through the Automated Teller Machines (ATM) during the period witnessed a decline by 23.07 per cent to a value of N3.74 trillion from N4.86 trillion recorded during the first quarter. There was a 1.33 per cent fall to N994.91 billion in the total Point of Sales (POS) transaction value during the period from N1.01 trillion in the previous quarter.

Also, total online transfers dipped 25.89 per cent to a value of N72.24 trillion as at the close of June, from N97.48 trillion in the first three months of 2020, while the transactions via the mobile app saw a surge of 4.75 per cent in the period under review as people stayed at home to observe lockdown and social distance, closures of some bank branches, as well as the migration of most banks to online transactions via their mobile apps during the lockdow