Reuters/Claro Cortes IV

A shopper at a mall in Shanghai passes an advertisement for credit cards with "triple happiness" Chinese characters. The advertisement, photographed on Monday, is part of a campaign to entice people in China, still largely a cash-based society, to purchase goods and services on credit. The country has seen a drastic increase in the use of "plastics" with its financial infrastructure improving and increasing household wealth.

About 24 million of the 438 million bank cards issued in the country are "quasi credit cards", which provide local currency overdrafts but require a certain level of funds in bank accounts, Yuwa Hedrick-Wong, economic advisor for MasterCard International, said.