The report analyzes information as of January 2026, except for that involving withdrawals, credit cards, debit cards, prepaid cards, and transportation cards, which is updated as of December 2025 (latest data available).

In January, instant push transfers in pesos increased 24.2% y.o.y. in volume.

− In pesos: There were 675.9 million instant push transfers for an amount of ARS81.2 trillion, climbing 24.2% y.o.y. in volume, and 19% y.o.y. in value, in real terms. Seventy-six point two percent of transactions were made from or to a virtual account through a single virtual code known as CVU.
− In foreign currency: There were 2.4 million transactions (4.7% y.o.y.) for an amount of USD3,420.7 million (-2.4% y.o.y. in original currency).

Instant pull transfers in pesos reached 40.2 million in January.

− There were 40.2 million transfers for an amount of ARS3.8 trillion, up 4.3% y.o.y. in volume and 12.5% y.o.y. in value, in real terms.

Interoperable payments by transfer (PCTs) using QR codes totaled 92.1 million transactions in pesos.

− There were 93.3 million PCT transactions (48.1% y.o.y.) in pesos, for a total of ARS2.1 trillion (51.8% y.o.y. in real terms).

o QR: 98.8% of PCTs were initiated through QR codes—92.1 million payments (53% y.o.y.) for ARS2.1 trillion (57.3% y.o.y. in real terms). Payments from sight accounts (CBU) represented 53.1%, and payments from payment accounts (CVU), 46.9%. At stores, 54.3% of transactions were credited to payment accounts, while the other 45.7% were channeled to sight accounts.

Currently, there are 86 interoperable e-wallets and 61 PCT acquirers registered with the BCRA.

o Token payments: 1.2% of interoperable PCTs were made through a token, accounting for 1.1 million payments (-58.7% y.o.y.) for an amount of ARS36.5 billion (-50.3% y.o.y. in real terms).

Payment accounts and funds invested through payment service providers that offer payment accounts (proveedores de servicios de pago que ofrecen cuentas de pago, PSPCPs)

In December, there were 68.7 million payment accounts, out of which 15 million recorded a balance totaling ARS0.8 trillion. In turn, the balances of money market funds reached ARS7.4 trillion in the same month. Payment accounts and money market funds jointly accounted for 7.4% of total private sector deposits in pesos. There are currently 215 PSPCPs included in the Registry of Payment Service Providers.

Direct debit

In January, there were 11.3 million direct debits (-7.6% y.o.y.) for a total of ARS1.8 trillion (-0.2% y.o.y. in real terms), with a success rate of 43.6%.

Checks: Electronic checks (ECHEQs) accounted for 82.8% of cleared amounts in December

− Almost 5 million checks (in paper and electronic form in pesos) were cleared for ARS21.7 trillion. The share of e-checks in total cleared checks was 60.4% (3 million) in terms of volume and 82.8% (ARS17.9 trillion) in terms of value.
− Additionally, e-checks in dollars were recently implemented: 24 checks were cleared for a total of USD3.9 million in January.
− Checks returned for insufficient funds: The rate of returned checks for insufficient funds over total cleared checks was 2.1% in terms of volume, and 1.4% in terms of value, recording a drop against December 2025.

Cards: Credit card use exceeded debit card use

− Debit cards: There were 162.8 million debit card transactions for an amount of ARS4.9 trillion in December (latest data available), exhibiting a decrease of 28.4% y.o.y. in volume, and of 30.1% y.o.y. in value, in real terms. Also, in December there were 9.7 thousand transactions in foreign currency for USD6.1 million (98.9% were channeled through e-commerce).

− Credit cards: The number of credit card transactions reached 181.6 million for an amount of ARS10.6 trillion, changing -1.8% y.o.y. in volume, and -7.9% y.o.y. in value, in real terms. The most commonly used channels included: POS and QR, 38.8%; e-commerce, 37.6%; and automatic debit, 14% in terms of volume.

Interoperable QR codes represented 5% of total credit cards in terms of volume. Lump-sum payments accounted for 85.1% in terms of volume and 61.8% in terms of value.

− Prepaid cards: In December, there were 43.5 million payments for an amount of ARS0.7 trillion, changing 16.2% y.o.y. in volume and -20.2% y.o.y. in value, in real terms.

Transportation

− Transportation prepaid cards: There were almost 305 million trips (-14.4% y.o.y.) paid with SUBE cards in December for a total of ARS0.157 trillion (falling 7.1% y.o.y. in real terms).
− Public transport fares paid through QR codes: In January there were 15.9 million trips for a total of ARS16.2 billion, mostly in buses (14.7 million, 92.4% of the total) and subway lines (1.2 million, 7.6%).

Electronic credit invoices for MSMEs (factura de crédito electrónica MiPyME, FCEM)

In the month, 85.7% of transactions were made in pesos. In other words, 72 thousand electronic invoices for an amount of ARS1.5 trillion were processed in the system for the open transfer of e-invoices (sistema de circulación abierta, SCA).

Withdrawals

Eighty nine percent of withdrawals were made from ATMs.

− Withdrawals from ATMs: In December (latest data available), there were 55.5 million withdrawals from 17,275 ATMs for an amount of ARS5.3 trillion. The average number of monthly withdrawals per ATM was around 3,212 averaging ARS95.5 thousand.
− Non-bank withdrawals through debit cards: There were 4.1 million transactions amounting to ARS0.3 trillion, withdrawals averaging ARS66.6 thousand.
− Non-bank withdrawals from payment accounts belonging to the same PSPCP (closed loop): 2.4 million transactions were conducted for ARS0.14 trillion, withdrawals averaging ARS61 thousand.