Summary
Digital payments in the Philippines surged, with recent transfer fee waivers driving InstaPay and PESONet transaction volumes to more than double as of July. Combined value reached P19.162 trillion in H1 2026, up 44.82% year on year, while transactions more than doubled (155.16%) to 4.976 billion. The growth came as financial institutions lowered or waived interbank retail fund transfer fees in compliance with BSP Circular 1238, which required fair, market-based pricing.
Key Points
- Combined InstaPay + PESONet value: P19.162T in H1 2026, up 44.82% YoY
- Transactions more than doubled (155.16%) to 4.976 billion
- InstaPay value up 60.32% to P9.509T; volume up 160.08% to 4.9 billion
- PESONet value up 32.23% to P9.653T; volume up 15.36% to 76.4 million
- Fee waivers driven by BSP Circular 1238 (June 17) on fair, market-based pricing
- Interbank fees should not differ materially from intrabank; switch fee ~P1.50
- 95 InstaPay participants (mostly nonbank e-money issuers); 124 PESONet participants
- BSP target: digital payments 60-70% of retail volume by 2028
- 2025: online payments 64.7% of retail volume (up from 57.5% in 2024)
- Digital payments value share: 53.3% in 2025 (down from 59%)