European Card Fraud - Total Threat Levels
See which countries have the highest ratios of fraud losses to card sales
The Story in Basis Points
Most countries remain steady with minor changes in terms of their basis points. The UK, France, Spain, Netherlands, Germany, Italy, Portugal, Austria, Czech Republic, Ukraine, Romania, and Turkey have all seen a decrease in fraud value in relation to overall transactional value, while Denmark, Hungary, Greece, Norway, Sweden, and Poland have seen increases.
Some notable changes include France, where there has been a decrease of 1BPS, despite fraud losses remaining steady. Instead, overall transactional values grew in 2024 in France, perhaps driven in part by tourism for the Olympic Games in Paris but also strong fraud prevention methods which have seen losses decrease and stabilise over the last five years. The UK remains steady at 4.5 BPS, despite an increase in fraud losses.
Notable on the other side of the coin, Greece has seen an increase in BPS up to 3, driven by a significant increase in fraud losses of 19% from 2023 to 2024. Denmark has also seen a shift from 3.6 to 4.2BPS, driven by a similarly large jump of 20% in fraud losses. Changes in the card fraud landscape are clearly causing issues in certain areas and having an impact on BPS performance.
Payments fraud continues to grow and adapt to changing consumer payment trends; a unified approach (across channels, products, industries, organisations, regions) is becomingly increasingly vital to beat fraudsters at their own game.
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.