Fantastic plastic
Central Europe, and especially Poland, is slowly becoming a paradise for payment-card producers. The two leading companies in both Europe and Poland, Visa and Mastercard, are experiencing a boom in the region, with profits and revenues reaching millions of euro and the total value of non-cash transactions reaching into the billions.
Visa Europe reached EUR 646 (zł.2,492) million in revenue and a gross profit of EUR 89 (zł.343) million in its first 15 months of being a legally incorporated company, while its current share of the market equals 52 percent. The total number of cards produced amounted 296.6 million in September 2005 (a 10.5 percent increase year-on-year) and the value of non-cash transactions reached EUR 684 (zł.2,638.6) billion, which equals a growth of 15.4 percent year-on-year.
In Poland, Visa noted an increase in the value of non-cash transactions by 20.3 percent (worth EUR 4.7 billion, or zł.18.1 billion), while the number of cards it produced reached 11.1 million (a 7.6-percent y-o-y rise).
Mastercard, the second-biggest card producer both in Europe and Poland, reported 1.25 million cards produced in Poland to September 30, 2005, with the total value of transactions in Poland reaching $1.2 (zł.3.8) billion during the period, a 35-percent rise.
According to Mastercard Polska's marketing director, Hanna Stakiewicz-Dziełak, the market in Poland is quickly catching up with Western Europe in terms of the number of people who own some kind of a card.
Visa officials are also optimistic. "The Polish market is still in its infancy in comparison to Western Europe, but developing very fast," Visa Europe's senior vice president, Edvj Massazza-Gal, told the WBJ. "So, if you continue to experience such a quick increase in the market, you will catch up with 'old Europe' in several years.
"The fact that the Polish banks are close to fulfilling all the conditions required to join the Single European Payment Act, currently enforced by the European Central Bank in the majority of 'old' EU countries, will be very helpful," she added.
