- JAMCLEAR-RTGS records 4.2 million transactions worth JMD 22.4 trillion year-to-date
- Cheque volumes plunge 22.4% year-to-date as Jamaica’s digital migration accelerates
- POS terminal count rises 9.7% but transaction volumes fall 11.3% year-to-date
- JMD ABM transaction values surge 21.6% year-to-date as cash demand strengthens
- USD ABM withdrawals fall 27.3% in value; dual currency cards down 5.7%
- Hurricane Melissa adds weather disruption to October payment infrastructure pressures
Jamaica’s payment infrastructure processed 4.2 million high-value interbank transactions through October 2025 while the broader retail payments landscape continued a structural shift away from paper instruments — but the picture was complicated by a sharp divergence between declining point-of-sale activity and surging automated banking machine cash demand, a split that raises questions about the true pace and depth of Jamaica’s digital payment transition.
The Bank of Jamaica’s October 2025 Payment System Data Bulletin provides a cumulative picture of Jamaica’s electronic and retail payment flows for the first ten months of the year. Through October, the JAMCLEAR-RTGS system handled 4,218,507 transactions with a total JMD value of JMD 22,375.14 billion and a USD value of US$2,585.12 million. Merchant banks continued to dominate the system, accounting for 93.98 percent of all transaction volumes and 66.54 percent of JMD values.
Cheques in Freefall: A 22% Decline Signals Structural Change
The most unambiguous trend in the October bulletin is the accelerating decline of cheque-based payments. Through October 2025, JMD cheque volumes totalled 4.26 million, down 22.4 percent from 5.49 million in the same period of 2024, with value falling 21.0 percent to JMD 751.94 billion. USD cheques mirrored the trend: volumes declined 22.5 percent and value fell 21.9 percent year-on-year.
A decline of more than 20 percent sustained across all currency denominations is not a statistical blip — it is a structural transition. Businesses that once relied on cheques for supplier payments and payroll are migrating to electronic fund transfers and direct bank credits. Consumers are shifting to online banking platforms. The Bank of Jamaica’s ongoing efforts to modernise the National Payments System have actively encouraged this migration, and the data through October 2025 confirms it is proceeding at a rapid pace. The implications for banking infrastructure are significant: cheque processing is operationally intensive, and its rapid decline frees capacity for digital alternatives while reducing systemic paper-handling risk.
The POS Paradox: More Terminals, Fewer Transactions
One of the more analytically striking findings in the October bulletin is the divergence between POS terminal expansion and POS transaction volumes. Jamaica’s installed POS terminal base grew to 34,583 units through October 2025, a 9.7 percent increase from the 31,527 terminals recorded in October 2024. More terminals in more merchant locations should, in theory, generate more card transactions. Instead, the opposite is occurring.
JMD POS transactions through October 2025 totalled 75.22 million in volume, down 11.3 percent from 84.75 million in 2024, with a value of JMD 1,016.30 billion compared with JMD 1,136.40 billion the prior year — a 10.6 percent decline. USD POS transactions fell 11.2 percent in volume and 8.7 percent in value. Several explanations are plausible: merchants who installed terminals during post-pandemic rollout may be experiencing lower card acceptance rates as consumer preferences shift toward mobile payment platforms; some terminal growth may reflect installations in lower-traffic rural locations; or a portion of spending once captured by POS is now migrating to instant bank transfers and mobile money platforms recorded separately from traditional POS networks.
ABM Cash Demand Surges — Jamaica Draws More Cash Than Ever
In apparent contradiction to the narrative of digital transition, JMD ABM transactions have surged strongly through October 2025. JMD ABM transaction volumes reached 55.87 million year-to-date, up 14.2 percent from 48.94 million in 2024. More strikingly, the JMD value of ABM transactions reached JMD 1,008.18 billion — a 21.6 percent increase from JMD 829.09 billion the prior year. Jamaica’s ABMs are not merely being used more frequently; Jamaicans are withdrawing larger amounts with each visit.
The surge in JMD ABM demand alongside declining POS usage reveals a nuanced picture: many Jamaican consumers are drawing larger cash amounts from ABMs and then spending that cash in the economy — at markets, in informal service transactions, in the real estate sector, and in smaller retail environments where card acceptance remains inconsistent. This pattern is consistent with a cash-intermediated digital economy rather than a purely digital one: Jamaicans are accessing their funds electronically through ABMs but completing many transactions in cash. The practical implication is that ABM infrastructure — reliability, availability, geographic reach — remains a critical economic enabler, not merely a banking convenience.
USD Channels Signal Structural Shifts in Foreign Currency Behaviour
The USD-denominated payment channels tell a more cautionary story. USD ABM cash withdrawals fell 20.8 percent in volume and 27.3 percent in value through October 2025, reaching US$248.01 million compared with US$341.03 million in 2024. This sharp contraction reflects both the decline in the outstanding stock of USD dual-currency debit cards and potentially a change in how Jamaican consumers access foreign currency.
The dual-currency card count fell to 38,961, down 5.7 percent from 41,310 in October 2024. The decline has been gradual but consistent throughout the year — a structural product rationalisation that has steadily reduced the pool of cardholders able to access USD through the ABM network. USD credit cards in circulation fell 1.0 percent to 24,937. The sharp drop from a mid-2025 high of over 45,000 dual-currency cards has now stabilised in the 38,800–39,000 range, suggesting a permanent reduction in the product’s market footprint rather than a temporary disruption.
Hurricane Melissa and the October Context
October 2025 brought an additional challenge to Jamaica’s payment infrastructure in the form of Hurricane Melissa, which caused selective disruption to banking and ATM operations across the island. The storm prompted precautionary decommissioning of machines in high-risk locations and caused sporadic power and telecommunications outages that affected both ABM availability and electronic payment processing. The hurricane’s effects will have had some depressing impact on transaction volumes in October, though the precise quantum within a ten-month cumulative aggregation is modest.
The hurricane context is nonetheless relevant for interpreting the October data. The combination of storm disruption, ongoing structural shifts in payment channel preferences, and the sustained decline in USD-denominated activity created a complex operating environment for Jamaica’s payment infrastructure in the final quarter of 2025. The resilience of the JAMCLEAR-RTGS system — which continued processing billions in interbank settlements throughout the storm period — reflects both the robustness of the infrastructure and the Bank of Jamaica’s disaster recovery protocols.
Implications for Jamaica’s Economy and Property Market
The October bulletin reinforces a picture of Jamaica’s payment system in active transition — away from paper, toward electronic, but with a significant and growing role for cash that complicates a simple digital-first narrative. For banks and payment service providers, the POS utilisation paradox suggests that terminal deployment alone is insufficient to drive card transaction growth; consumer education, merchant incentives, and the quality of the payment experience at the point of sale all matter as much as hardware rollout.
For Jamaica’s real estate sector, the sustained growth in JMD ABM transaction values is directly relevant. Property transactions at all price points involve cash at some stage, whether in the form of deposits, legal fees, agent commissions, or vendor payments in the informal land market that underpins significant portions of rural and peri-urban Jamaica. The 21.6 percent year-on-year increase in the value of JMD ABM withdrawals through October 2025 signals that cash demand is expanding — and with it, the economic importance of maintaining a reliable, well-distributed ABM network that can meet that demand even in the face of hurricane disruptions and the ongoing complexities of Jamaica’s digital payment transition.
Follow Jamaica Homes on Youtube @jamaicahomes and Instagram @jamaica_homes and on Facebook @jamaicahomesnews Send us a message or email us at onlinefeedback@jamaica-homes.com or editor@jamaica-homes.com
Visit our YouTube Community ↗