Rakuten Card aiming for 100 billion yen profit, eyes 1,100 trillion yen B2B market
Japan's largest credit card company, Rakuten Card, is aiming to almost double its annual operating profit to 100 billion yen ($663.7 million) in the medium term and sees opportunity in expanding into the largely untapped business-to-business payments market, its new chief executive officer said. Although Japan's shrinking population is hitting demand in much of the domestic economy, the credit card and payments markets are a rare growth area as digitalisation of financial services booms in what was once a cash-dominated economy. Rakuten Card, which can only be applied for online and is part of Rakuten Group - an e-commerce and financial services conglomerate - has ridden this wave to issue more than 30 million credit cards to date and booked an operating profit of 62.1 billion yen in 2024, up more than 20% on 2023.