Dive Brief:

• Only 8% of U.S. consumers engage in online transactions every day, versus 35% in Brazil and more than 20% in several countries, including Saudi Arabia, Japan and United Arab Emirates, according to the results of a study by the survey firm YouGov and the London-based fintech Checkout.com.
• While nearly all of China’s consumers (93%) have adopted a digital wallet for making payments, and 80%, or more, of the populations in Saudi Arabia, Brazil, Egypt and the United Arab Emirates have, only about two-thirds (65%) of U.S. consumers have downloaded such apps, according to results of a survey for the study by YouGov.
• Meanwhile, a quarter of China’s population uses digital wallets to make peer-to-peer payments every day, and a fifth of consumers in Brazil do the same, but only 9% of Americans use the tool daily, according to a survey of 18,000 adults across 16 countries. The study didn’t provide information on how or when the survey was conducted.

Dive Insight:

The report from Checkout.com and YouGov sketches out the global differences in trust levels for using digital payment tools and engaging in online checkouts. Compared to other regions, European and North American consumers tend to exhibit more skepticism when it comes to e-commerce transactions than consumers in other parts of the world, the study suggested.

While the study was initially issued in May, Checkout.com highlighted the global disparities in an Aug. 13 press release. Major providers of digital wallets in the U.S. include Apple and Google, though they are typically linked to consumers’ credit cards, debit cards or bank accounts.

The top reason that U.S. consumers said they were short on trust in using digital payments for commerce was that they are uncertain about the safety of the checkout. Nearly half (46%) of U.S. consumers expressed that uncertainty. That was the same reason for concern with consumers in 11 of the 16 countries, with the percentage being about the same in most of them.

The top reasons for concern in the other five countries related to the ease of use and the lack of a preferred payment method offered. 

Part of the mistrust for U.S. consumers may be related to half of them reporting they have been a victim of fraud when using their cards for payments (the study wasn’t clear about whether it was credit or debit cards). Still, consumers in Brazil reported even higher levels of card victimization (53%) and the percentage in the United Arab Emirates was the same as in the U.S.

And even though they have very different digital payment use rates, consumers in the U.S. and China were nearly equally nervous about storing their card data on an e-commerce site, with that being the case for 43% in China and 42% in the U.S.

Checkout.com’s report echoes other research suggesting that card fraud remains a problem for consumers and payment providers alike.

A Nilson report released earlier this year projects that fraud losses in card payments will reach $403.88 billion over the next decade. Meanwhile, 73% of financial institutions surveyed by the Federal Reserve Financial Services said debit cards were the top payment method for fraud attempts in 2024. 

Peer-to-peer payments are also a hotspot for fraudsters. An AARP survey released last year found that about a fifth of adult peer-to-peer payment users have been an “intended victim” or a victim of “financial exploitation.” Of those targeted for scams, four in ten lost between $101 and $1,000, the survey of 2,014 adults found.