ABSTRACT
PAYMENT INSTRUMENTS COMPRISE CURRENCY, cheques, other debit transfer instructions, credit transfer instructions, credit and debit cards, and electronic money. Fragmentary estimates indicate that cash is still used in the majority of payment transactions (i.e., volume) in all countries,1 but that these transactions tend to constitute a relatively small proportion of the value of total transactions (Borio and Van den Bergh 1993, pp. 9-10). For obvious reasons, however, these estimates of the volume and value of cash transactions are only indicative.
