As per top official from the National Payments Corporation of India, India has the potential to process 100 billion Unified Payments Interface (UPI) transactions per month. This would represent a tenfold increase over the 10 billion transactions achieved by the platform's August 2016 launch. Dilip Asbe, chief executive officer and managing director of NPCI, stated that there are currently 350 million UPI users and that the development prospect in merchants and users is three times more.

 

"...if you take the combined effect, we have a 10x opportunity from where we stand," Asbe said speaking at the Global Fintech Fest here.

 

He declined to name a target date for NPCI's arrival, but stated that by 2030, India will see 2 billion transactions every day. At the moment, global behemoth Visa processes 22.5 billion transactions every month, while rival MasterCard processes over 11 billion.

 

Asbe further stated that if the sector changes to the emerging trend of sachetisation, credit card usage might increase tenfold, but only if banks supply the necessary platforms. At the moment, the cost of credit card acquisition and underwriting is too high, posing a hurdle to the inclusion agenda, but digital and technical services can assist reduce it, he said.

 

Regarding the internationalization of the UPI, Asbe stated that such attempts require regulatory assistance, and that by 2030, NPCI hopes to have the necessary tie-ups in place to facilitate seamless payments between India and half of the top-30 markets. Asbe further stated that the body is in discussions with Singaporean authorities to raise the single transaction limit from SGD 1,000 to above SGD 5,000.