The card scheme says the latest results bring Visa's domestic payment card industry volume share to 51.3%, "larger than the combined share of all other US payment brands".

Debit continues to fuel growth and now represents 6.4% of payment share in the US, an increase of 23% over 2001. In line with the growing popularity of debit, Visa's overall volume dollar growth was driven by the Visa cheque card, which now represents a third of Visa's volume.

In 2002, the number of Visa-branded credit, debit, commercial, prepaid and smart cards in the US rose to 386 million. In addition, Visa processed more than 14.4 billion transactions, a 9.1% increase over 2001. Visa cheque card volume grew 17.2% to $380 billion. Visa's credit volume grew to $609 billion, an increase of 3.1% and represents 42.5% of total credit card spending. The company claims a market-leading 12% share of total US consumer spending.

Performance in new and emerging categories also rose, with 60% growth in e-commerce to $42.5 billion in volume, and transactions over the PIN-based point-of-sale network Interlink - through which consumers can use their ATM cards to get cashback at merchant tills - increasing by 71% to 755 million, with a consequent 79% uplift in volume to $26 billion.

Visa anticipates that electronic payments will continue to erode the use of cash and cheques over the coming years. In the consumer markets, the company says that up to 20 financial institutions are issuing prepaid Visa cards, while its next-generation commercial B2B card - intended to substitute for cheques in business procurement - is expected to become available in the "latter half" of 2003.