Americans are on track to charge nearly $2.7 trillion to their general purpose payment cards this year, about 13% more than last year. The projected figure includes $1.9 trillion in bank credit card charges and approximately $800 billion in debit card charges. About $400 billion of the total comes from business credit/debit card spending. The figure also includes purchases and cash advances. In the first nine months of this year, consumer and business cardholders made $1942.1 billion in purchases and cash advances on VISA, MasterCard, American Express and Discover credit/signature debit cards, according to CardData. Among the four networks, VISA maintained its lead with a 53.9% share. MasterCard has a 28.9% share, American Express has a 13.2% share and Discover has a 4.0% share, based on year-to-date figures for 2005. During this period, VISA and American Express have equally gained shares at the expense of both MasterCard and Discover.
| U.S. Year-to-Date Gross Dollar Volume |
|---|
| (excludes online debit) |
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| NETWORK | Q3 YTD GDV | SHARE |
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| VISA | $1046.3 billion | 53.9% |
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| MasterCard | $ 560.7 billion | 28.9% |
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| American Express | $ 257.1 billion | 13.2% |
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| Discover | $ 78.0 billion | 4.0% |
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| TOTAL | $1942.1 billion |
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| Source: CardData (www.carddata.com) |
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