BGN Entrepreneur

After a slow start due to a lack of payments infrastructure, the credit card market in China has started to grow more dramatically in the recent years. Sccording to Citi, it is said that the number of cards in issue recorded by the Chinese central bank reached 268m by last September, which was over 5 times the level at the end of 2006.
The market is restricted to a single card-processing company–Union Pay. Consumers’ use of credit cards lags behind the number in issue. However, according to the bank, the market’s growth potential is enormous, as processing improves and more merchants accept the cards. According to the 2010 annual report from the People’s Bank of China, it is revealed that all card-based transactions grew by more than 50% by value to Rmb10.4trn.
Citigroup will become the first western bank to issue credit cards in mainland China under its own brand. The move become another foot in the door for Citi on the mainland after it also won the preliminary approval in January to launch a joint-venture securities company with Orient Securities.

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