Beijing close to US in card-based consumption

35 yuan out of every one hundred yuan paid by people in Beijing is through bank card system. According to Beijing Daily, currently, the transaction volume has taken up as much as 20 percent of the total retail sales of consumer goods in Beijing, Shanghai, and Guangzhou and Shenzhen in south China's Guangdong Province, close to the average level of 30 percent to 50 percent in developed countries such as the United States.

At the end of 2004, consumption via bank card accounted for 35.77 percent of the total retail sales of consumer goods in Beijing, which was among the front rankings in China. Since the first bank card issued by the Beijing branch of Bank of China in 1986, 47.22 million cards have been issued in the city with more than three cards per capita.

By People's Daily Online