PRESS: Apple Pay, Samsung Pay boost demand for virtual cards

MOSCOW, Feb 21 (PRIME) -- The number of users of Yandex.Money, a payment service of Russian Internet giant Yandex, who pay for goods and services with virtual cards, with no physical analogue, soared five times in 2016, mostly thanks to a launch of contactless payment systems Apple Pay and Samsung Pay, business daily Vedomosti reported Tuesday.

Yandex.Money did not disclose actual numbers, but said that virtual cards turnover quadrupled and the number of transactions spiked by seven times.

Anastasia Vasilchenko, a spokeswoman for Yandex.Money, said that the service has 30 million electronic wallets, including 11 million with virtual cards.

Among other factors, growth in interest to virtual cards results from the start of work in the country of Apple Pay and Samsung Pay in late 2016, when the number of users surged.

Apple and Samsung’s payment systems allow owners of e-wallets to pay for goods and services not only in the Internet, but also in brick-and-mortar stores, restaurants and the like, Vasilchenko said.

Apple Pay is supported by 12 local banks and Yandex.Money, and the same number of lenders back up Samsung Pay, which also raised demand for virtual cards of Yandex.Money, which makes it possible to use Apple Pay and Samsung Pay to clients of those banks that do not work with the payment systems directly.

An owner of a card of any bank opens an e-wallet and attaches a virtual card to it. In case of a payment via Apple Pay or Samsung Pay, money from the banking card is transferred via the e-wallet to the virtual card and is charged from it.

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