Paying cash for shopping and services continues to decline in countries that previously had high cash-use preferences. Including Switzerland.

Switzerland is a country that has a long love affair with cash, but its use is dwindling, and buy now pay later (BNPL) has reached the same level of use in the country, according to a recent survey (registration required) from strategy&, which is part of the PWC network.

According to the study of people in 15 European countries in 2022, 35 percent of Swiss said that in paying for shopping purchases services, cash was their preference for people over 35. That figure declined from 45 percent in 2020 and 60 percent in 2018.

Swiss Preference

Interestingly, in 2022, the percentage of people in Switzerland under 35 using cash was the same as those who are older, whereas most others saw less cash use among the younger. One exception was France, where only 22 percent of those over 35 preferred cash, whereas for those younger it was 28 percent.

Austria and Germany had the highest cash preferences among the countries surveyed at 57 and 56 percent, respectively Sweden was at the low end at 15 percent-

Buy Now, Pay Later

Fintechs and established players are scrambling to expand their footholds in the buy now pay later (BNPL) segment, as finews.com reported. In Switzerland, the number of BNPL users is the same as cash at 35 percent, the results showed, which is the same as the average. Turks and Swedes were the biggest adopters and 51 and 50 percent respectively while only 20 percent of Danes expressed at least a partial preference. 

SNB Makes Case for Cash

In a speech yesterday, the Swiss National Bank (SNB) vice-Chairman laid out his case for the importance of cash, as finews.com reported. While saying the SNB does not have a preference for whether transactions are settled in cash or a form of electronic payment, he nevertheless stressed how important cash was for the financial system.

There are «risks in a strong shift towards cashless payment methods. Declining cash usage puts economic pressure on the cash infrastructure,» he said. A survey by the SNB showed similar preferences for cash used in Switzerland. In 2017, 70 percent of respondents preferred cash, falling to 43 percent in 2020.

Data Sharing Reluctance

One thing that companies have to grapple with in developing their open banking offerings is data privacy. It is clear that the more data they have, the more they can refine and expand their offerings. To some degree, data privacy is also a constraint for developing technologies around customer data.

«Is it still a limitation? Absolutely – and a necessary one: Data privacy has to be respected,» said Frédéric Brunier senior managing director and Europe lead for cloud-platform-data at Accenture told finews.com in an October interview.

The willingness of people to share their data in exchange for benefits has remained steady over the three most recent surveys conducted at 20 percent. Those unwilling to share their data were also very entrenched. In 2018, 58 percent were unwilling to share, dropping to 55 percent in 2020 and rising back to 57 percent this year.

Among the most trusted institutions were banks at 20 percent in the 2022 survey, while neobanks/fintechs and the «internet giants» were the least trusted at 5 percent. 

API Usage 

Both traditional banks and fintechs are making increased use of application programming interfaces (APIs) as they digitize their businesses. 

The report shows just how widespread their use has become. With just 7 million successful calls in September of 2018, the number rose 291 percent from 139 million in September 2019 to 541 million a year later. In September of this year, there were nearly one billion calls, having risen 23 percent to 977 million from last September. 

The Strategy& survey was conducted among 5,750 participants in 15 countries in September and October.