The latest publication from Germany-based market research company yStats.com, “Top Mobile Payment Service Providers in Malaysia 2020 and Their Reaction to the COVID-19 Crisis” gives insights into mobile payment service providers’ activity in Malaysia. The publication reveals that consumers are becoming more open to cashless transactions, especially under the impact of the coronavirus restrictions.
Malaysian consumers turn to digital wallets during the coronavirus pandemic
During the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Malaysian Government provided monetary incentives to its citizens to increase usage of E-Wallets. The three biggest players on the Malaysian digital wallets market were selected to participate in the distribution of government funds, which led to double-digit increases in the user base of each of them during the first half of 2020. After the initiative ended, Malaysia headed the list of E-Wallet adoption across countries of Southeast Asia, according to figures cited in the new yStats.com report. The number of E-Wallet accounts in Malaysian had been showing a steady upward trend throughout pre-pandemic 2019 and the year on year growth rates have become even higher in 2020.
Top mobile service providers are rapidly accumulating users amid the pandemic
The top four mobile payment service providers in Malaysia, by consumer preference and their transaction market share are Touch ‘n Go, Boost, GrabPay, and BigPay. Maybank with its Maybank2u, an E-Wallet Mae, and a newly introduced all-in-one payment and financial management app is also among a player on the digital payment scene but this may be attributed to it being the largest bank in Malaysia that is able to provide services far beyond those of a standard E-Wallet. Roughly one-third of Malaysian customers were registered with Maybank2u at the end of the second quarter, 2020. Touch ‘n Go, on the other hand, was the only E-Wallet that appeared among the top ten Malaysian app publishers amid the second wave of the coronavirus pandemic in October 2020, as detailed in the yStats.com publication.
Due to COVID-19 Malaysians opted for special services from their E-Wallets
The onset of COVID-19 multiplied the number of remittances being sent using free of charge services of the Malaysian digital wallets. BigPay underwent an almost five-fold surge in remittance amounts during the first half of 2020, in contrast to the year before, according to a report cited by yStats.com. Additionally, active users’ spending amounts via E-Wallets are notably going up, as for example, Boost’s transaction value doubled by the end of the second quarter of 2020 compared to the end of 2019.
