【英文】巴克莱报告：全球支付与金融科技行业：向无现金社会的过渡（77页）

Despite the fact that we regard this acceptance and convenience as a current advantage of  cash, this should not be taken for granted. Even though cash is defined as legal tender in the  majority of countries, this does not prohibit merchants from refusing cash in many  countries. For example, in the UK and a handful of European countries (including Germany,  the Netherlands and Ireland among others), cash can be declined by merchants, and there  are increasing examples of this, as we discuss in this note.  Immediate settlement: a traditional benefit of cash  Immediate settlement is a benefit of cash that has been particularly important to merchants.  In contrast, the amount of time required for a card transaction to settle can vary depending  on region, and such transactions are not instantaneous. Instant settlement options, instant  account-to-account payments and the growth of P2P and mobile payments are bridging  the gap between cash and alternative payments methods, while regulation including PSD2  is accelerating the innovation around such solutions. We view the space for instant  payments as fiercely competed at the moment, with fintechs forcing banks to accelerate  their services. Thus, while instant settlement has been a key advantage of cash, we believe  that this competitive advantage is beginning to be eroded.

A more topical advantage of cash is that it allows for a high degree of anonymity. In a pure  cash transaction, no digital audit trail is created (though clearly this does not hold when  cash is deposited into a bank account, for example). Although some concern over black  market facilitation is undoubtedly justifiable, we are of the view that, from a consumer  perspective, the demand for anonymous payments may be a rational and perfectly legal  choice. From a social and democratic perspective, we believe that it may be questionable to  decommission cash if this is the only payment method allowing for anonymous  transactions. This is, of course, a delicate topic, although we are of the view that, with  increased scrutiny on data usage, consumer demand to remain anonymous in some  transactions may be a reason for resistance to digitalisation of payments; it may also  depend on political and cultural attitudes, which differ by region.