The Unified Payment Interface (UPI) saw a decrease of 6% in the total transaction volumes taking place between April 2019 and May 2019, according to data published by the National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI). Transactions had declined between March and April 2019 as well. The NPCI is a private company owned by Indian banks and owns and operates important payments systems such as UPI and IMPS. The total number of transactions in May 2019 was around 3.87 times higher than in the same month last year. The amount transacted went up by 7% to Rs 152,449 crores over April. The amount transacted in May 2019 was 4.6 times higher than in May 2018. However, given the limited impact of seasonality on digital payments, and the fact that this is pipped to be a high growths sector, month-on-month data needs to be looked at. Some observations 1. Although the amount transacted increased this May 2019, the number of transactions has been on the decline from last 2 months. As a result, transaction per day for the first time decreased to 23.66 crores from 26 crores as compared to the preceding month. 2. The number of transactions declined by 48.3 million in May whereas the total amount transacted increased by Rs 10,414.9 crores. In April 2019, volume had decreased by 17.8 million and the amount transacted had raised by Rs 8,573.7 crores. 3. The average amount per transaction grew to Rs 2,078 for May 2019 with a sharp decrease in the number…
