Issuers Strengthen Debit Program Performance, Confront Challenges

Debit payments continued to grow and evolve in 2023, with more card use shifting to card-not-present (CNP) and mobile transactions. This is a key finding from the 2024 Debit Issuer Study.

“By offering the convenience of digital payment options and focusing on fraud prevention, issuers are empowering their cardholders to use debit in more ways across a broader range of channels,” said Steve Sievert, PULSE Executive Vice President of Marketing and Brand Management.

At the same time, debit issuers face a number of challenges, ranging from customer retention to regulatory uncertainty. Despite these headwinds, financial institutions remain cautiously optimistic about the future of their debit portfolios.

Debit Use Continues to Evolve

Despite a year-over-year (YOY) increase of only 1% in the number of debit cards for the issuers surveyed, debit transactions and dollar volume each rose 4% YOY in 2023. Active cardholders completed 34.6 transactions per month in 2023, including 30.7 point-of-sale (POS) transactions, 2 account-to-account transfers, and 1.9 ATM transactions.

POS use per card grew at an average annual rate of 4.4% between 2018 and 2023. The average debit ticket size was $46.89 in 2023, an increase of 3.4% per year, on average, over the period. Annual spend per active card was $17,274, up an average 8.1% per year between 2018 and 2023.Debit use has not just grown but shifted in the past decade. More than one-third (36%) of debit transactions and 45% of debit spend is now in the CNP channel. And mobile devices account for 7% of debit transactions. These two metrics were essentially zero a decade ago.

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Debit Cards

Issuers Strengthen Debit Program Performance, Confront Challenges

Debit Use Continues to Evolve

In Depth

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