The Monetary Authority of Macao released today the credit card statistics for the fourth quarter of 2014. The total number of personal credit cards in circulation was 830,791 at the end of December 2014, equivalent to an increase of 1.3% over a quarter earlier. The numbers of Pataca (MOP) cards, Hong Kong Dollar (HKD) cards and Renminbi (RMB) cards were 599,052, 77,779 and 153,960 respectively. MOP cards and RMB cards witnessed respective growth of 2.6% and 2.3% quarter-to-quarter, whereas HKD cards registered a drop of 9.1% due to adjustments of credit card business by individual banks. Compared with a year ago, MOP cards and RMB cards (the majority of which are MOP/RMB dual-currency cards) rose 12.0% and 9.9% respectively whereas HKD cards dropped 2.4%.
As at end-December 2014, credit card credit limit granted by banks in Macao reached MOP17.3 billion, up 5.0% from end-September 2014. Credit card receivables amounted to MOP2.2 billion while the rollover amount totalled MOP590.4 million, accounting for 27.1% of credit card receivables. The delinquency ratio, i.e. the ratio of delinquent amount overdue for more than three months to credit card receivables, edged down to 0.84%.
For the fourth quarter of 2014, the credit card turnover increased 12.9% quarter-to-quarter to MOP4.6 billion. The cash advance turnover was MOP214.8 million, accounting for 4.7% of total credit card turnover. Credit card repayments, in which payments for interest and fees are included, went up 4.9% from the previous quarter to MOP4.4 billion.
