Pix, the Central Bank of Brazil’s new instant payment method, has completed three months of operations this week and already leads the number of money transfers. In 2021, 286 million operations have been made, according to the Central Bank of Brazil. The number of registered Pix keys is now over 159 million.
Did Pix replace TED transfers?
With the entry of the instant payment, speculation was that the new payment method would replace TED transfers. In terms of the number of money transfers, 53.2 million TED operations have been made so far in 2021 – only 18.5% of total Pix transfers. But when it comes to the transacted amount, TED transfers lead the way: while the instant payment has carried out BRL 225 billion operations in 2021, TEDs have reached BRL 2.7 trillion.
What can explain this phenomenon?
There has been a large adoption of P2P – person to person – transactions with the new payment method. But the amount carried out by companies is still low: B2B operations represent only 2.5% of the total carried out in January. On the other hand, P2B – person to business – represent 8.3%, and B2P operations – business to person – reached 7.2%. The main reason is businesses’ apprehension regarding fees, in addition to the fact that Pix does not allow installment payments.
Next step
The instant payment’s B2B adoption should increase as new functionalities are launched. According to the Central Bank of Brazil, new features should be released throughout this year:
• Salary account: this feature will allow Pix transactions with salary accounts.
• Creation of a return mechanism: in case of fraud suspicion or failure in a participating institution’s systems, PSPs will be able to return the resource from the receiver.
• Withdraw: users will be able to carry out cash withdrawals in establishments dedicated to this service.
• Proximity payments: this feature will allow proximity payment via Pix in POS machines with NFC technology.
• Initiating payments with Pix: following the timeline established for open banking in Brazil, this will allow initiators to participate in Pix, encouraging competition.
Further, the Central Bank of Brazil has also announced that, as of the second half of the year, two new products should begin being developed: Pix Garantido, which will allow installment transactions with the new payment method, and Pix Débito Automático, which will enable automatic debit payments.
More details can be found on the Central Bank of Brazil’s official website.
Want to learn more? Check out our content series on the new payment method!