One-in-three Hongkongers leaving plastic credit cards in favor of e-wallets

More than one-third of Hong Kong consumers are ditching plastic in favor of e-wallets, according to a new FIS report on global retail payment trends.

The report showed that e-wallets are now the preferred way for Hong Kong consumers to pay for goods online. Data from the Worldpay from FIS product suite shows that more than a third (36 percent) of all online retail purchases made in Hong Kong last year were via digital wallets, followed by credit cards (30 percent) and bank transfers (12 percent). In Hong Kong, digital wallets are the preferred payment method for shopping online for clothing and footwear, electrical goods, and health and beauty products, accounting for 36 percent, 44 percent and 32 percent of these purchases respectively.

Even though credit cards still lead in-store, when it comes to shopping online, Hongkongers embrace digital wallets such as Alipay, WeChat Pay and PayPal, which now account for 36 percent of all online retail purchases.

The report also shows a growing consumer preference for mobile commerce, which currently comprises 16 percent of all online retail in Hong Kong. Mobile commerce is expected to grow by 34 percent by 2022.

“Consumers in Hong Kong are increasingly choosing digital payments over the more traditional credit-debit card combinations when shopping online, according to our 2019 Retail Global Payments Report,” said FIS GM for APAC, global enterprise e-commerce, merchant solutions Phil Pomford.

The report also highlights Hong Kong’s strong overall retail e-commerce growth, which is expected to grow by more than 18 percent to almost US$4 billion by 2022. During the same period, in-store sales are also projected to grow by 4 percent compound annual growth rate (CAGR) to be worth US$70 billion, indicating the sustained long-term health of the retail industry in Hong Kong.

The data was published in FIS’s 2019 Retail Global Payments Report, an analysis into payments trends of 16 countries from across the world, representing 80 percent of online global retail and 60 percent of instore global retail sales.