He payment of servicesthe shopping in supermarkets and the consumption in retail stores These are the three main uses that cardholders give to their products in the Dominican Republic, transactions that continue to grow, at least since 2023.
Between January and October of this year, the point of sale terminals of the different businesses in the country registered 496.1 million transactions with cards, a figure that already exceeds by 65 million those registered in same period of 2024when they totaled 431.1 million. Meanwhile, they already exceed those of all of 2023, which totaled 437.4 million.
This is reflected in the figures of the Central Bank of the Dominican Republic (BCRD), which establish that in the aforementioned 10 months of 2025, card transactions reached 1 billion 032,810.1 million pesosan increase of 12.3% in relation to the 919,296.3 million traded in the same period last year.
Almost half of the use that users give to the cards is for pay serviceswhich include fun and entertainment, communicationstransactions in hotels, bars and restaurants, education, health and transportation, among others.
From January to October 2025, the 47.4% of transactions at points of sale it was in stores servicesequivalent to 235.1 million. These operations totaled 463,406.9 million pesos, representing a 44.9% of the amount traded during that period.
Increase in transactions
The figures show an absolute increase in 21 million transactions additional, when compared with a similar period in 2024, when they added 214.1 million. While in economic terms they represent an increase of 39,808.2 million pesos in reference to the amount traded between January and October of the previous year, when it reached 423,598.7 million pesos.
These were followed by shopping in supermarkets. The BCRD records indicate that in the aforementioned period of this year, in these businesses 120.5 million operations with cards, for an amount of 234,034.3 million pesosrepresenting 24.3% and 22.6% of the total, respectively.
Likewise, both figures show an increase compared to January-October 2024. In the case of transactions, they accumulated an absolute increase of 14.5 million and the amount paid 21,321.3 million pesos.
The cards are also used for the purchase of fuel, airline tickets, membership organizations, wholesale distributors and manufacturers, agriculture and other services, according to the BCRD report.
Retail stores occupy the third position on the list of businesses where their users carry out the most card operations and amount paid. In these establishments, purchases worth 211,523.6 million pesos were recorded from January to October 2025, through 79.8 million transactions, the latter already exceeding those carried out throughout last year, when they reached 74 million.
