Credit cards

While the vast majority of Greek professionals may have installed card terminals for their business transactions, as obliged by law, many refrain from using them, opting instead for cash transactions.

Banking giant HSBC more than doubled pre-tax profit to $17.2 billion in 2017, it announced on Feb. 20, after a recovery drive to streamline its business and slash costs.

The US Department of Justice announced that 36 people were indicted for involvement in a global identity theft over the Internet, causing damages of over $ 530 million to consumers, companies and financial institutions, BNT said.

Bulgarian cardholders are very interested in the possibility to pay via their mobile phone, according to the mastercard MasterIndex 2017. According to the survey, two-thirds of the active cardholders in Bulgaria want to pay with their smartphone at a store by bringing the mobile device to a contactless terminal as well as online via a mobile application.

Fines from the Traffic Police can now be paid online as well - through the "Easypay" platform, announced Dnevnik.

HSBC said profits were up in the first half of the year after a turbulent 2016 which saw huge writedowns and restructuring costs as it laid off thousands of staff.

The Asia-focused giant has been on a recovery drive over the past two years, streamlining its operations and exiting unprofitable businesses.

Month after month the use of credit and debit cards in everyday transactions is setting a new record, as taxpayers become increasingly accustomed to using plastic money.

Greek consumers are making more and more online purchases and tend to use or are particularly interested in new methods of payment, such as digital wallets and the special apps developed by banks for cell phones, according to Mastercard's Masterindex survey.

A Focus Bari survey conducted for Mastercard found that card transactions soared by 50 percent in January, the first full month since the implementation of a law that only allows taxpayers who pay for their purchases with plastic to qualify for an income tax discount.

Demand for credit and debit card terminals doubled in the first few days of 2017, as the government's plans to consider only electronic payments toward attaining a tax discount has forced Greeks to start using cards more instead of cash.