As of October 1, 2011 banks issued 9.3 million charge cards - National Bank of Kazakhstan

/IRBIS, October 31, 2011/ - As of October 1, 2011 in Kazakhstan, second-tier banks issued 9.3 million charge cards, and the number of holders of cards made up 8.6 million people, announced today the National Bank of Kazakhstan. It is noted that in comparison with the situation on the same date in 2010 there was an increase of 10.4% and 9.8% respectively. The most common are debit cards, their share was 87.8%, the share of credit cards - 10.6%. The share of debit cards with credit limit and prepaid cards was 1.6% and 0.1% respectively. In September 2011 the volume of transactions using payment cards issued by Kazakhstan issuers accounted for 390.2 billion (increase compared to September 2010 amounted to 31.9%). The number of transactions for September 2011 amounted to 13.4 million transactions, and increased in comparison with September 2010 to 17.7%. The increase in the number and amount of non-cash payments amounted to 22.4% (2.6 million transactions) and 34.0% (52.5 billion), operations and cash withdrawal 16.6% (10.9 million transactions) and 31.6% (337.7 billion), respectively. According to the National Bank, the number of POS-terminals in the country on October 1, 2011 amounted to 27,579 against 24,871 for the same date last year, the number of ATMs during this period increased to 7,920 from 7,441, the number of commercial enterprises that serve payment cards reached 11,657 against 10,564 a year later. As of October 1, 2011 20 banks and JSC "Kazpost" implement issue of charge cards. These organizations produce and distribute payment cards of international systems (which account - 97.4%): VISA International, MasterCard Worldwide, American Express International, China Union Pay and Diners Club International. Moreover, the banks of Kazakhstan payment cards produced for local systems: Altyn Card - JSC "Halyk Bank of Kazakhstan"; SmartAlemCard - "BTA Bank" and the local card Citibank Kazakhstan - JSC "Citibank Kazakhstan". [2011-10-31]