CNBV detects three problems in the payment processing market

At the ninth Convention of the Mexican Association of Sofipos (AMS), the vice president of regulatory policy, Lucía Buenrostro, said that the regulator detected three problems in this sector.

1. The lack of competition. With only two clearinghouses, Visa and Mastercardgenerate barriers to entry for other competitors.

2. A concentration of risks. With only two clearing houses, if one of them were to fail, users would be massively affected. “Imagine if at one point both clearing houses were to fail, for whatever reason, there would be no card payments across the country. So, I think it’s a problem, something we would have to consider,” he said.

3. Generating incentivesThe third problem that the Commission identifies has to do with the Point of Sale Terminals (TPVs) and the right incentives to do business without affecting consumers. Without these incentives, there will be no market that wants to do business and the fewer players, the less competition. Less competition, higher prices.

“The CNBV agreed to work on eliminating these barriers to entry to payment media networks. We have been doing this for many years, we have not thrown in the towel because I think there are problems that take more time but that does not mean they cannot be resolved,” Buenrostro said.

Buenrostro highlighted that until May of this year, 455 million transactions have been detected at POS terminals with Sofipo cards, which represents a growth of 14.6% compared to the same period in 2023.

In the case of cell phone payments, growth was 31.9%, according to the CNBV. Until last May, cell phone payments by Sofipo clients amounted to 388 million transactions.

On average, Sofipos users make 17.5 million transactions in 2024, which contrasts with the average of 8.1 million that were made in 2023.