European Card Fraud - Total Threat Levels
See which countries have the highest ratios of fraud losses to card sales
The Story in Basis Points
Many countries are sitting on high basis points (BPS), an indication that fraud losses are disproportionately high relative to overall consumer card spending. PSD2 guidance mandates that TRA (Transaction Risk Analysis) exemptions apply under certain basis point thresholds, which countries like France, Hungary, and the United Kingdom (which has adopted identical PSD2 guidance) will be paying close attention to. The threshold for applying TRA exemption for payments of below €250 sits at 6 BPS.
Many countries have kept consistent basis points, such as the Czech Republic, Austria, Poland, Italy, Netherlands, Germany and Spain. This indicates that despite increases or decreases in fraud losses, these countries are keeping a steady hand on fraud prevention. Denmark has managed to decrease its BPS, despite an increase in consumer spending, going from 4.16 in 2024 to 3.43 in 2025. This is a significant step in the right direction for Denmark, where issuers have kept fraud loss change to 0% while consumer spending grows. Spain has had a similar decrease, although by a smaller increment (1.85 to 1.79).
The story is a little different in other countries. France has seen an increase from 4.24 to 4.74 BPS, underscored by a decrease in overall consumer spending. Their overall fraud losses have not increased by much, but as consumer spending is down, the proportion of fraud to overall spending has shifted. Hungary has increased from 3.39 to 4.69 BPS, and Norway has increased from 2.41 to 3.91; these are the highest increases of all the countries. Unlike France, both countries have seen increases to their consumer spending as well as fraud, indicating that their fraud losses are worsening in relation to overall spend.
*Fraud basis points is a standard measure of card fraud severity, and can show how a bank or a country compares to others. 1 basis point is equivalent to 1 cent per €100. It works the same in any currency and provides an indicator of the fraud-to-sales ratio.