At the G20 Summit in Bali, the central banks of Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, and Thailand entered a memorandum of understanding to start using QR codes for international payments between the five countries, without the need to use the US dollar.
The Bank of Thailand (BoT) hopes to halve the amount of cash in circulation in Thailand by 2026, with the eventual goal of turning Thailand into a cashless society.
The bank is also fine-tuning the PromptPay system used to make digital payments easier within Thailand.
By promoting QR code payments within Thailand and Southeast Asia, the bank aims for 42% of all payments in Thailand to be digital by 2024 with each person making 800 digital payments per year.
However, the bank’s agenda to move toward a cashless society is not favored by most Thais. A study conducted earlier this year found that nearly all Thai people deemed cash as essential to daily life, and 50% of Thais said they would continue using cash for day-to-day payments.
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