IN Brief:
- EBANX and World Data Lab say over-45s account for 53% of online spending across Italy, Germany, France, and the UK, with the UK at 49%.
- In faster-growth markets, younger consumers and account-to-account payment rails are taking a larger share of online demand.
- For merchants expanding internationally, the gap points to different fulfilment, payments, and market-entry assumptions across mature and emerging markets.
New data from EBANX and World Data Lab suggests that Europe’s largest e-commerce markets are being sustained by an older and wealthier customer base than many global growth strategies assume. Across Italy, Germany, France, and the UK, consumers over 45 account for an average of 53% of total online purchase value, with the UK at 49% and Italy as high as 60%.
The contrast with emerging markets is sharp. Buyers under 30 account for 65% of online spending in Nigeria, 62% in Kenya, 52% in Egypt, 51% in the Philippines, and 47% in India. The numbers point to a different demand profile, different basket structures, and a different pace of customer acquisition in markets where digital commerce has grown through mobile-first behaviour and instant-payment rails rather than through legacy card infrastructure.
Estelita Hass, head of market intelligence at EBANX, said the developed economies are “deep but narrow, with high spending concentrated among an older, affluent base,” while emerging markets are “broad and getting broader.” That broadening is visible in household spending as well. Online channels account for an average of 7.7% of total household expenditure across the four European countries studied, compared with 22% in India, 15% in Nigeria, and 11.5% in Brazil.
For retailers and logistics providers, that changes the planning problem. Mature European markets still offer purchasing power and established service expectations, but the faster growth is elsewhere. EBANX said consumer spending in emerging markets is projected to rise by 94% over the next decade, against 49% in developed economies, while more than one billion people are expected to enter the consumer class across emerging economies over the same period.
The payment mix reinforces the point. Account-to-account transfers already make up 60% of online transactions in India and 45% in Brazil, and EBANX expects A2A to keep taking share in markets including Colombia, Nigeria, and the Philippines. For cross-border operators, the customer model familiar in Europe — older, card-based, and relatively affluent — does not readily map onto the next wave of e-commerce demand.
