Study on payments volumes in the middle east, and reference to global trends.

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The Middle East will also match the global trend (-3.09%) of abandoning the cheque with a 3.66% decline. Kuwait is both the highest user of cheques in 2004 (104.47m of the 151.67m recorded within the Middle Eastern countries studied) and is predicted to exhibit the fastest decline at -5.77% by 2009.The market forecast, commissioned by ACI Worldwide, a leading international provider of solutions for electronic payments, and conducted with Global Insight, a provider financial and economic forecasting, showed that only EasternEurope (21.60%) and Asia Pacific (19.19%) will experience faster electronic payments growth.

The Middle Eastern country which is predicted to have the highest growth rate is the United Arab Emirates. Already exhibiting a growth rate at 24.14%, the UAE is set to continue strongly through to 2009, increasing the number of its electronic payments by 21.11% to 189.64m. With its sizable population and mature market, Saudi Arabia is also developing strongly, and is set to see an increase of 17.45% to 897.67m.