East Asia & Pacific · GDP rank #27
Thailand
TH · THB @ 0.0306/USD
Tab 03
Rails & infrastructure
The instant rail, the RTGS spine, the card switch, the direct-debit scheme, and the country's CBDC stance. Each rail is reported with operator, launch year, and 2024 flow so the relative scale across rails is readable at a glance.
CBDC status is deliberately granular: live, pilot, preparation, live stalled, and sceptical, no pilot are different things.
BOT Retail CBDC pilot concluded; wholesale work continues via mBridge
Target · Retail decision deferred; BOT emphasises PromptPay sufficiency
Thailand ran an early retail-CBDC pilot in 2022-23 and formally concluded in 2024 that PromptPay's reach made retail CBDC unnecessary. Wholesale CBDC work continues via mBridge cross-border.
Instant payments
PromptPay
The instant leg typically carries the vast majority of retail consumer flow in modern payment systems — and sits in direct tension with card networks and wallets for the same transactions.
Alias-based addressing (national ID, mobile, e-wallet ID). 90m+ registered IDs against an adult population of ~52m. ~74m PromptPay transactions per day (June 2025).
- Operator
- National ITMX under BOT oversight
- Live since
- 2.0k
- Per-txn limit
- 5,000,000 THB
- Fee per txn
- THB 0 for consumers
Cleared value · 2024
Participating institutions
RTGS
BAHTNET
The RTGS spine clears high-value interbank flow — including the settlement of the instant-rail cycles and card-network net positions. Transaction count is modest; cleared value is enormous.
- Operator
- Bank of Thailand (BOT)
Transactions · 2024
Cleared value · 2024
Card switch
National ITMX
Thailand's domestic switch, bank-consortium-owned; operates PromptPay, TPN (Thai Payment Network), and ORFT interbank.
Source · National ITMX
Direct debit
Direct Debit (ORFT-style recurring)
Direct debit is the boring rail that carries recurring subscriptions, utilities, and payroll pull-payments. It is routinely the largest single channel by count after cards.
Transactions · 2024