Ireland is fast moving towards becoming a cashless society, with new data from Visa showing a 12.7% rise in card spending last year to €31.7bn. Visa Europe, which issued the figures for 2015, said that, by the end of last year, there were 5.7m cards in the Irish market. Around 80% of them are debit cards.

In line with a general rise in consumer spending, car sales rose by more than one third last month compared to the same period last year.

There was no slowdown in Irish consumer spending last month, new figures indicate.

Irish consumer spending continues to rise steadily with shoppers splashing out most on shoes and clothes last month.

More than 100 jobs were yesterday announced for Dublin and Kildare by two companies.

Consumer confidence is continuing to rise with Irish people starting to splash out more on holidays and cars.

Consumer expenditure in Ireland increased in June, according to Visa Europe's Irish Consumer Spending Index.

People are spending more on food and drink and household goods as consumer confidence continues to grow.

Irish consumer confidence is growing again as people are starting to spend more money on nights out and shopping.

THIS week’s sale of Picasso’s 1955 painting Les Femmes D’Alger for $179.4m may be a temporary high water mark in two of the age’s defining characteristics — consumerism and materialism. It also points to an increasing concentration of wealth.

Visa’s Irish operations had a record year in 2014 with €28.4bn being spent by consumers via the payments technology firm’s products.

Some €21.3bn worth of consumer transactions were carried out last year via Visa card products in Ireland.

Irish businesses are being urged to keep up-to-date with payment technology trends with card-based spending by overseas visitors nudging the €800m mark this year.

Four people were arrested at Dublin airport on Thursday in possession of airline tickets purchased with stolen credit cards.

Despite allegations to the contrary, print media does not print just bad news.

The shadow economy is costing the Government roughly €20bn, which is 12% of total GDP, because of undeclared or under-reporting of earnings.

AIB is the latest Irish bank to be hit with a technical problem with up to 80,000 customers affected by a glitch with its point-of-sale terminals.

Visa is anticipating that by 2015 €1 in every €3 spent by Irish consumers will be via one of its products — credit, debit, or pre-paid cards.

Amazon is to launch an online premium fashion store tomorrow in a bid to take on the likes of Net-A-Porter and ASOS.

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange expressed surprise today after the European Commission (EC) said a block on processing donations for his organisation by credit card companies was unlikely to have violated EU anti-trust rules.

Retail Ireland is calling on the Government to introduce measures to keep spending in the domestic economy.

Consumers in Ireland carry about €78.2m in cash every day — or about €23 each.

Tesco’s virtual changing rooms allow you to ‘try on’ clothes online. Deirdre Reynolds starts clicking

CONSUMERS in Ireland are increasingly shifting towards an electronic payment culture, new figures suggest.

THIS week will the busiest period for online shopping in 2011, as shoppers increasingly move from the high street and go online in search of Christmas bargains.

Retailers have demanded no hikes in excise duty as a survey showed a sixth of motorists plan to Christmas shop across the border.

IRELAND and Portugal were the only European Union member states to register declines in consumer spending during the second quarter of this year, despite an average quarter-by-quarter rise of 2.5% across the EU.

MORTGAGE arrears at Ulster Bank and First Active have soared to over 11%, according to rating agency Standard & Poor’s.

CONSUMERS will be able to swipe debit cards and pay for small transactions in “less than a second” with the introduction of contactless technology.

A CORK-based security software company is to help a new international federation combat cybercrime, it was announced yesterday.

THE pursuit of better value has seen the total spent online by Irish consumers rise by almost 40% in a year to €2.96 billion.

Irish people spent about €2.96bn online last year, up by 39% on 2009 figures, new research has found.

MORE than €1 trillion was spent on Visa cards in Europe in the 12 months to the end of September as Irish usage also increased.

VISA expects its super fast debit card to be launched in the Irish market this year — it allows small transactions be completed in one fifth of a second.

British retailers are enjoying another hectic day as consumers hampered by bad weather grab their last chance to buy for Christmas.

WikiLeaks’ payment processor is preparing to sue credit card companies Visa and MasterCard over their refusal to process donations to the whistle-blowing website.

BRITISH online shoppers are set to spend a total of £537 million (€632m) today in what is predicted to be the busiest internet shopping day of the year.

SHOPPERS are going online for greater savings, splashing out an estimated €2.1bn last year on internet credit card purchases.