Total Payment Card Shipments by Material

Concerning the physical card side of the payments market, ABI Research forecasts major growth in the number of sustainable payment card shipments, reflected in a significant downfall in shipment volumes of first-use Polyvinyl Chloride (PVC) payment cards from 3.1 billion in 2021 to 2.5 billion in 2026.Recycled PVC (rPVC) will become, by far, the largest replacement of first-use PVC in the payment card market, especially in Europe, where the presence of a high number of major card vendors, such as Thales, IDEMIA, and Giesecke+Devrient (G+D) have established rPVC as a mainstay material. Driven by large issuing banks in Europe and spreading across all regions, the convenience, price point, availability, and integration with existing personalization infrastructure will lend itself well to seeing rPVC shipments increase from 177.5 million shipments in 2021 to 638.0 million in 2026.

With a higher recycle rate and less environmentally toxic manufacturing and disposal process than PVC, coupled with a more accessible price point than Polylactic Acid (PLA), Polyethylene Terephthalate Glycol (PETG) has found a niche in the payments card market, growing from 33.1million shipments in 2021 to 105.1 million in 2026. PLA has also seen higher growth than originally anticipated. Advantages for the materials lie in it being a truly biological material and being technically biodegradable, though these benefits are somewhat offset by a much higher cost from a raw materials perspective, coupled with a shorter life cycle. ABI Research forecasts PLA to increase from 31.7 million shipments in 2021 to 97.1 million in 2026.

Reclaimed and ocean-bound plastic will see the majority of its growth in the North American region, where there is a higher appetite for the material among card issuers and consumers. Championed by CPI Card Groups offering of the Second Wave card, reclaimed and ocean-bound plastic cards are very appealing from an end-user perspective, due to the removal of waste plastic from the environment, though smaller card vendors may struggle with unstable supply chains of raw materials. Nevertheless, reclaimed and ocean-bound plastic cards will see shipment volumes increase from 44.7 million in 2021 to 89.9 million in 2026.