Mexico

Mexico was an early adopter of real-time payments in Latin America, with its Sistema de Pagos Electrónicos Interbancarios (SPEI) system having been in place since 2004. Despite its head start in the region, adoption of real-time payments has been slow due to the country’s high unbanked population and lack of awareness about electronic payments. However, the growth of real-time payments gained some traction in recent years, with the launch of Cobro Digital (CoDi) in September 2019, which extended the use of real-time payments to low-value, day-to-day payments through QR codes and NFC technology.

Currently, real-time payments hold only an 8.3% share of overall payments in Mexico, far lower than paper-based payments, which dominate the market with a share of 80%. Mexico is, however, one of the slowest-growing markets in the region, with the lowest forecast CAGR in Latin America at 7.9% from 2023 to 2028.