28 February 2019, Baku: The Central Bank of the Republic of Azerbaijan jointly with the Azerbaijan Banks Association (ABA) announced the results of the contest on various nominations on development of cashless payments, introduction of innovative payments, expansion of e-banking and e-commerce and awarded winner banks.
Alim Guliyev, the First Deputy Governor of the Central Bank mentioned at the event that development of cashless payments in the country is one of the most critical priorities for the Central Bank; the Bank takes ongoing appropriate actions and implements projects with the ABA, the Financial Markets Supervisory Authority (FMSA), related public authorities and the banking sector.
Central Bank’s projects with the banking sector and continual reforms on expansion of digital payments are reflected in statistic data as well. In 2018 the size of transactions via interbank payment systems y/y increased by 31% to AZN274 B (3.4 times of GDP) while the size of cashless payments in card turnover made up 17%, this indicator stood at 6% five years ago. The size of e-banking operations increased by 18.7 times to AZN36.4 B, while the number of operations increased by 7 times to 10.4 mln pcs.
The said indicators allow to say that efforts on development of cashless payments in the country, raising financial literacy of the population, and instilling cashless payment habits among broad public are yielding positive results.
Highlighting the ‘State Program on expansion of digital payments for 2018 - 2020’ signed in September 2018 by the President Ilham Aliyev, who provides critical political support for digital economy building in the country, he detailed the participants on new targets and the projects under way by the Central Bank.
Zakir Nuriyev, President of the ABA said at the award ceremony that global trends suggest that rapid developments are under way on digitalization of banking and cashless economy building. The developed cashless economy means a resilient banking sector and its expanded resource base, which both reduces expenses and makes banking services more accessible, widens their investment potential and accelerates credit investments to the economy.
It is known that, large-scale related efforts are under way in our country. The State Program laid the foundation of a new and more rapid phase of transformation to the cashless economy. The state-of-art State Program combines comprehensive multi-faceted priorities on improvement of the institutional environment of digital payments, banking system rehabilitation, formation of a digital ecosystem, and boosting financial literacy and promotion efforts. The ABA was recommended to be involved in a number of actions in realization of the State Program and all necessary actions will be taken to realize them.

The event was finalized with awarding of the following banks on 5 nominations announced by the Central Bank in 2018:

“Leading bank on cashless payments at POS-terminals”:
Place I “Premium Bank” OJSC;
Place II “Pasha Bank” OJSC;
Place III “ACCESSBANK” CJSC.

“Leading bank in e-banking services”:
I “The International Bank of Azerbaijan” OJSC;
II “UNIBANK KB” OJSC;
III “Kapital Bank” OJSC.

“Leading bank in e-trade development”:
I “AGBank” OJSC;
II “UNIBANK KB” OJSC;
III “Expressbank” OJSC.

“Leading bank on contactless payments”:
I “Expressbank” OJSC;
II “Nakhchivanbank” OJSC;
III “Pasha Bank” OJSC.

“Leading bank on contactless POS-terminal infrastructure”;
I “Pasha Bank” OJSC;
II “Expressbank” OJSC;
III “AtaBank” OJSC.

The Central Bank will continue concerted efforts with the FMSA, the ABA and banks on expansion of digital payments to realize the targets set in the Strategic Roadmap and the State Program.

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