A view of the Qatar Central Bank (QCB) in Doha. The total value of all transactions processed through SIPS accounted for 416% of the country’s 2014 GDP, the QCB said in its latest Financial Stability Review.

Transactions valued at QR3,211bn were processed through Systemically Important Payment Systems or SIPS in Qatar last year, which QCB said indicates the growing popularity of electronic cash settlement in the country.
In its latest Financial Stability Review, the Qatar Central Bank said the total value of all transactions processed through SIPS accounted for 416% of the country’s 2014 GDP.
To compare the same with the previous year, the total value of all transactions processed through SIPS was 448% of 2013 GDP.
The volume of transactions through automated teller machines (ATMs) and point of sale (PoS) increased during the year, more so in the domestic region than in the GCC markets, indicating a healthy adoption of electronic means of transactions.
The real-time gross settlement system (RTGS) processed on an average 1092 SWIFT transactions and around 563 high value (above QR250,000) cheque transactions on a daily basis in 2014. In case of SWIFT transactions, while the number of transactions grew by nearly 18% in 2014 as compared to a year ago; in value terms, it witnessed a decline of 6%.
In contrast to SWIFT transactions, the increase in the number of cheque transactions was around 7% but value of cheque transactions increased by 19.5%.
The analysis of the volume and value of transactions through various modes illustrates that transactions via electronic means took precedence over the medium of cheques in the past year.
The payments and settlements infrastructure in Qatar comprise Qatar Payment System (QPS), GCC Net, National ATM & POS Switch (NAPS) and Qatar Money Rates (QMR).The QPS system is designed on the concept of Real-Time Gross Settlement (RTGS) and Electronic Straight through Processing (e-STP).
GCC Net is a single ATM network linking all the GCC National Switches.
NAPS is an interface that hosts and settles all retail electronic transactions flowing between local banks. QMR is a monetary instrument through which local member banks are allowed to deposit with; and borrow from QCB; overnight funds with a pre-specified initial interest rates and bank-by-bank ceiling.
The growth in different modes of payment and settlement systems in Qatar in both value and volume terms over the previous year is considered and analysed. It is observed that in value terms, the transactions processed by SWIFT decreased by around 6.1% in 2014.
QMR deposits increased by 62.6% in value terms and by 37.8% in volume terms during 2014 as compared to the previous year.
While transactions under QMR Lending fell by 73.5% in 2014 in value terms, the same decreased by 44.1% in volume terms in the same period.