Digital Transactions Authoritative, insightful and timely information for payments professionals
By Jim Daly
@DTPaymentNews
JPMorgan Chase & Co.’s merchant-processing subsidiary surpassed $1 trillion in payment volume last year, the New York City-based banking giant reported Friday.
Chase Commerce Solutions, the No. 2 U.S. merchant acquirer after First Data Corp. and the biggest acquirer owned by a banking firm, posted merchant-processing volume of $1.06 trillion, up 12% from $949.3 billion in 2015, JPMorgan Chase reported in its fourth-quarter financials. For the quarter, Chase Commerce Solutions posted merchant volume of $284.9 billion, an increase of 10.3% from $258.2 billion a year earlier.
Chase Commerce Solutions is a major power in e-commerce payments and has been growing in part thanks to its ChaseNet, a closed-loop network that processes transactions from holders of Chase Visa-branded credit and debit cards when they make purchases at Chase Commerce merchants. Participating ChaseNet merchants now include Wal-Mart Stores Inc.
Chase, which bills itself as the leading U.S. credit card issuer based on sales volume and loans outstanding, also said fourth-quarter sales volume on its consumer credit cards totaled $148.5 billion, up 13.5% from $130.8 billion a year earlier. For the full year, consumer credit card sales volume rose 10% to $545.4 billion from 2015’s $495.9 billion.
Fourth-quarter combined credit and debit card sales volume rose 11% to $219 billion from $197.3 billion a year earlier. The full year’s combined credit and debit card sales volume totaled $817.9 billion, up 8.5% from 2015’s $753.8 billion. Chase did not break out debit card volumes separately.
Chase also said it had 43.8 million active digital users in the fourth quarter, up 11.7% from 39.2 million a year earlier. The bank defines an active user as a customer who had logged into its Web or mobile platforms within the past 90 days. The active mobile customer base increased 16.3% to 26.5 million from 22.8 million in 2015’s fourth quarter.
The bank did not disclose data about Chase Pay, its person-to-person payments service that in late 2016 began offering in-store payments through the Chase mobile app at more than 7,500 Starbucks Corp. and nearly 1,400 Best Buy locations. Earlier this month, JPMorgan Chase struck a deal with Boston-based LevelUp to add order-ahead capabilities to Chase Pay.
