Payment card fraud losses across the globe continue to climb, according to new research from The Nilson Report, a company that provides information about the payment card industry. Fraud losses reached $27.85 billion in 2018 and is expected to climb to $35.6 billion in five years, and above $40 billion in the next ten.
Payment card fraud losses include losses incurred by payment card issuers, merchants, acquirers of card transactions from merchants, and acquirers of card transactions at ATMs on all credit, debit, and prepaid general purpose and private label payment cards issued around the globe.
U.S. fraud losses were $9.47 billion in 2018, one third of the global total, even though U.S. cardholders generated only 21.54% of $40.582 trillion in global card volume in 2018. However U.S. fraud losses represented 10.83 cents for every $100 in cardholder spending, a decline from 11.12 cents per $100 the previous year.
Payment card issuers worldwide lost $19.21 billion to fraud in 2018, with issuers accounting for 68.97% of gross fraud losses worldwide. Merchants, merchant acquirers, and ATM acquirers accounted for the other $8.64 billion or (31.03%).
“While fraud as a percentage of all card dollar volume declined for the second year in a row, criminals saw double-digit growth in the money they were able to steal from the system. Card fraud netted criminals $3.88 billion more in 2018 than in 2017,” said David Robertson, Publisher of The Nilson Report, in a prepared statement.