Digital Payments and Business Resilience : Evidence in the Time of COVID-19
During the COVID-19 pandemic, consumers were encouraged to use contactless payments. An important policy question is whether merchants with contactless payment technology are more resilient to an external health shock than those without. Using a ma...
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| Format: | Working Paper |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
World Bank, Washington, DC
2021
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| Online Access: | http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/254831621276819378/Digital-Payments-and-Business-Resilience-Evidence-in-the-Time-of-COVID-19 http://hdl.handle.net/10986/35613 |
| Summary: | During the COVID-19 pandemic, consumers
were encouraged to use contactless payments. An important
policy question is whether merchants with contactless
payment technology are more resilient to an external health
shock than those without. Using a matched
difference-in-differences setting on unique merchant
card-sales transaction data, this study finds that merchants
with contactless payment technology increase their
card-sales amount (count) on average by 8.3 percent (10.2
percent) compared with merchants without this technology. It
also finds evidence that accepting contactless payment
during an epidemic shock helps merchants attract more new
consumers. Digital payment technology continues to support
sales growth, especially for small businesses and new entrepreneurs. |
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