47% of women with credit cards in Ecuador are single. In addition, most of them are between 26 and 45 years old.
When Adriana Cedeño got her first credit card I was 24 years old and had barely College graduate. At 33 years old, this foreign trade engineer already he has five credit cards.
She claims that she has learned to don’t get into debt in spend more what you can afford with your income.
The youth of Liga de Quito, Juan Macías, signs for Sao Paulo
“One of the benefits of using cards is that, if you manage them well, you sow trust so that banks are willing to give you loans when necessary,” he says.
Adriana is single, but you don’t need to get married. That’s it paying a house and occupies a managerial position in his employment. Besides, He is studying English to do one masters in england.
In Ecuador, most women with a credit card have a profile similar to Adriana’s.
The profile of the female cardholder
He 47% of women con credit card active in Ecuador is singleaccording to a study by the Equifax credit bureau.
just the 35% corresponds to married women. The remaining 18% are made up of widows, divorced or in free union.
Equifax further found that the 54% of women with a credit card in Ecuador has between 26 and 45 years.
Why do single women have more credit?
One of the characteristics of the women of the millennial generation (between 27 and 40 years) is that they have postponed marriage. This generation has prioritized what academic.
Hence, women today have best jobs than those of previous generations. and that’s why they have more income and the ability to borrow, says Sonia Zurita, a finance professor at the Espae business school of Espol.
Entities approve credit cards for people who have payment capacitythat is, with sufficient income and employment stability to pay a debt, explains Zurita.
Another element that weighs, in the case of single women without children, is that they have fewer expenses to face. that’s why they have more disposable income and a greater ability to pay debts, says Zurita.
How much money do women move with a card?
He average quota of women with a credit card is USD 5.000according to Equifax.
In the Sierra, women have higher average quotas, USD 5.300.
A variable that influences quotas is he employment and wages. Las women have lower quotas than men because they have lower salaries than them, either because they work in informal sectors or because of the wage gap.
This is explained by Verónica Artola, sub-dean of the Faculty of Economics of the Pontificia Universidad Católica de Ecuador (PUCE).
Hence in the coast and in the Amazon, where there are more informal economic activities, the women have lower quotas.
The wage gap also explains why the Average spending of women with a credit card is less than that of menadds Artola.
“Women spend less because they have less income than men,” says Artola.
He women’s average spending with card was USD 182 inwhile that of the men was USD 200according to the ABC report on credit cards, from the Association of Private Banks (Asobanca).
There are pending challenges
Furthermore, even though the women are the ones that have less delinquency in your paymentslos men are the ones that have more cards and more quotas.
In 2022, of the 3.7 million active cards2 million were men and 1.7 million women, according to Asobanca.
In addition, the men spent USD 9,524 million with their cards in 2022, and women, USD 7,630.
Artola considers that one of the factors that influences is that in the financial entities still there are biases or stereotypes that the woman can’t handle credit well.
