The impact of electronic financial payments on crime

•Cashless transactions deter economic crime.•Role of electronic financial transaction technology in development policy.•First econometric analysis electronic financial transactions and crime.

In this paper, we test the hypothesis that access to electronic payments may reduce crime. Our results suggest that there is a negative and significant statistical relationship between access to electronic payments and the incidence of economic crimes such as robbery and burglary, while electronic transactions do little to reduce the incidence of non-economic crimes such as homicide and rape. This paper provides evidence that policies and technologies that enable the proliferation of cashless transactions have the desired impact of deterring crime.