A survey carried out by Doxa Kids, American Express and ABI in collaboration with Paypal unveils a contradictory relation between millennials and electronic payments.

The study reveals that the vast majority of teenagers aged 14-17 considers E-payment technologies useful mainly because of their simplicity, reliability and traceability, but at the same time they prefer to spend cash money. The real reason is probably connected to the their parents’ choices, in fact 69% of parents would rather give their children a cash money allowance, only 13% chooses to give them a prepaid credit card. In addition, parents feel that credit or debit cards are difficult to control: one more reason to give young people the instruments needed to deal with money responsibly. According to Doxa 75% of the respondents digital natives likes to shop online, and one-third of them think it’s better than traditional in-store shopping. When it comes to online purchases, women prefer to buy books, music, clothing and accessories. Men prefer to purchase videogames and Apps instead.

The study underlines an average monthly expense of 48 dollars. The methods of payment differ: 38% pays via Paypal, 22% uses a card owned by them, while the remaining 39% pays with their parents’ cards. There is very little knowledge about the unstable, volatile world of cryptocurrecies, because while 37% of the respondents considers E-money a groundbreaking payment instrument, most of them ignores the existence of other virtual currencies besides the notorious Bitcoin, but who could blame them? To this day not even grown-ups could get the hang of it.