Ecommerce is taking mobile by storm with 1 in 10 transactions in the United States being carried out using handheld devices in the lead-up to Christmas. Statista’s latest chart of the day, which you can find at the foot of the page, shows that the percentage of money spent using mobile devices is now worth 10 percent of retail ecommerce sales. The amount in dollars is just over $4billion with the market as a whole worth a little over $40billion and with Christmas on the horizon the number is only going to rise even further.
The trend is being driven by the sheer amount of people now using tablet computers and smartphones to do their shopping and the Christmas period is always one of the busiest. What it does mean is that PCs are seeing huge declines and it’s what many believe is behind the departure of Intel’s CEO, considering the reliance they have on the PC market.
PayPal has also announced that they’ve expanded their digital online and mobile payment platform by teaming up with FiftyOne Global Ecommerce. It gives the payment company access to a further 18 currencies with the Philippine Peso, Japanese Yen, Taiwan Dollar, Singapore Dollar and Brazilian Real. It opens them up to a number of Far East markets and the expansion could be of huge benefit to the gambling industry. Bear in mind that the gambling industry’s top market is Asia and the top growth area in online gambling is mobile then marrying the two together, with payments from a reputable firm like PayPal, can only be a good thing.
From all this it will be interesting to see in the period immediately following Christmas just how large the numbers are in terms of ecommerce spending and whether the number edges towards 2 in 10 transactions.
