Austerity Measures Have Been Recently Implemented in Greece, According to Report by Timetric Available at MarketPublishers.com

08 Jul 2016 • by Natalie Aster

LONDON – In response to the economic crisis, the Greek government had to implement a range of austerity measures in order to receive access to a bailout package (evaluated at USD 95.5 billion) from the IMF, the EU and the ECB. Therefore, the country’s government imposed capital controls and also took certain measures to curb tax evasion, outward flow of money, encourage electronic payments, restrict cash withdrawals at ATMs and restrict the use of payment cards abroad. On January 1, 2016, the latest measure was taken – the obligatory acceptance of card-based payments at retail outlets and also by certain professional categories (like lawyers, plumbers, doctors and electricians). All these measures are aimed at encouragement of a consumer shift towards card payments.

Presently, on the back of high operating costs and a decline in profits, Greek banks are trying to cut their infrastructure spending and adopt low-cost business models, for instance, digital banking.

Whilst, the Greek government placed restrictions on transactions from international on-line retailers, e-commerce activities within the country are outside the boundaries of these rules. To gain benefits from this, payment companies introduce novel on-line payment solutions for domestic on-line purchases; the latest one is the introduction of MasterPass by MasterCard in June of the current year.

Topical report by Timetric “The Cards and Payments Industry in Greece: Emerging Trends and Opportunities to 2020” offers deep insights into the structure of the Greek cards and payments marketplace. It explores the main market segment, discusses the latest changes and developments, examines the competitive scenario and discloses info on historicl and current market trends. A comprehensive future outlook for the domestic cards and payments market is also at hand in the report.

More research studies by the publisher are given on the Timetric page.

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