Colombia
Online Transactions Affect Colombia's Digital Payment Services
Population
Colombia had an estimated population of 50,882,891 at mid-year of 2020, according to UN data. Based on Worldometer elaboration of the latest UN data, Colombia had a population of 51,211,717 as of February 9, 2021, with 80.4% living in urban areas, mainly Bogota, Cali and Medellin. The median age of the population is 31.3 years. Colombia had an online population of about 30.9 million as of the end of 2019, according to the PPRO WECE Report.
E-commerce
The average annual revenue per paying user was $351 in 2019, according to the PPRO WECE Report. Colombia was the world’s 31st largest e-commerce market, with total revenue of $4 billion in 2019. Most cross-border purchases by Colombians are of products from the United States, China, Mexico and Brazil.
Payment preferences
Most Colombians prefer to pay by card (39%), followed by e-wallets, bank transfers, cash and other payment methods. For cashless payments, the big players are Visa, MasterCard and American Express.
Economy
According to IMF data, Colombia had a gross domestic product of $323.56 billion in 2019, which declined to $264.93 billion in 2020 due to the pandemic. Colombia’s current GDP is estimated at about $280.4 billion.
Internet & mobile phone trends
According to Statista, less than half of people aged 15-45 years have internet access, while only 9.6% of those 55 years and above go online regularly. There were 35 million internet users in January 2020, having increased by about 1 million (+2.9%) since 2019, raising the internet penetration rate to 62%. Meanwhile, smartphone penetration was around 75% by the end of 2019, according to the PPRO WECE Report.
Banking
According to the PPRO WECE Report, 46% of Colombians have bank accounts, with the same percentage of them credit card holders.